Patent ID: 7589740
Filing Date: 2009-09-15
Classification: G06T,G09B

Abstract:
1. A planetarium picture-creating apparatus comprising: a real time computing portion for computing a position of a celestial body in real time; a texture image memory portion for memorizing a plurality of texture image data expressing conditions of a surface of an object by relating to a range of distances from a viewpoint to the object; a reading portion for reading out one of texture image data in the texture image memory portion, an item of data that corresponds to a distance from the viewpoint to the object; an area determining portion for determining an extent of an area to be occupied by the object in relation to an entire image, and corresponding to a distance from the viewpoint to the object; a picture creating portion which, on the basis of texture image data read out by the reading portion, pastes a texture image onto the area determined by the area determining portion while creating a remaining portion of the entire image as a real time image on the basis of a computation result of the real time computing portion; and a distance specifying portion for specifying a distance from the viewpoint used by the reading portion and the area determining portion up to the object.