FAST VOLUME RENDERING

摘要

The invention relates to a system (100) for rendering a combined image based on a volumetric image data set, the system comprising: a rendering unit (110) for rendering a plurality of grayscale images based on the volumetric image data set; a color unit (130) for determining a first color for a first image of the plurality of grayscale images and a second color for a second image of the plurality of grayscale images, thereby defining a first color image and a second color image, respectively; and a combination unit (140) for combining the first color image and the second color image on a per-pixel basis into the combined image. Optionally, the color unit (130) may be further arranged to determine a further color for a further image of the plurality of grayscale images, and the combination unit (140) may be further arranged to combine the further image with the first image and the second image, using the first color, the second color and the further color. The combined image provides the user with information which is comprised in the first image and the second image and which is useful for inspecting the volumetric image data set. The system can be implemented using a general-purpose microprocessor and is sufficiently fast for interactive applications such as navigating through a volumetric image data set.