The L-system-based Simulation Of Visual Plant Growth

Plant, as an important part of the nature, is closely related to our life. Along with the research and development of fractal, the research of visual plant growth has become a hot topic, it plays an important role in agriculture and forestry research, design of scene virescence, education, entertainment, business etc., and it also has wide application in many areas. L-system is continually developing since Aristid Lindenmayer, America biologist, introduced it in 1968. It provides a new approach for configuration of plants. A.R.Smith etc introduced L-system to the computer graphics in 1984. All kinds of plants can be created by it in computer. It shows the powerful ability of computer in plants modeling, and provides theory support for realizing virtual plant growth on computer. This dissertation does much research on the definite L-system, stochastic L-system, parametric L-system, differential L-system and context L-system. Based on the theory of L-system, we develop a computer program to realize the Visual Plant System in VC++6.0, which uses the stand graphic programming interface of OpenGL. On the other hand, this dissertation introduces a new model for the plant organ in order to make plant generated more lifelike and intuitionistic, the drawing part of the program applies the technology of illumination and texture mapping. The plant, generated by the program, thus is three-dimensional, vivid, and accord with natural law. First the dissertation introduces the research status of virtual plant growth, and illustrates the significance of the task. Second it studies the theories of L-system and simply introduces OpenGL and model method based on images of organs. Third it emphasizes on the function modules of virtual plant system. Last the dissertation gives examples using virtual plant system. At the same time the research of this dissertation helps to discover a natural principle: a seemingly complicated natural phenomenon contains simple rules.