Patent ID: 8767011

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for culling nodes for rendering a three-dimensional environment, comprising: (a) determining a node having a drawable payload representing a surface portion of a curved three-dimensional model in the three-dimensional environment, at least a portion of the drawable payload being located within a field of view of a virtual camera in the three-dimensional environment, wherein the virtual camera defines a perspective to view content of the three-dimensional environment; (b) determining whether the virtual camera is located within a first substantially conical volume in the three-dimensional environment, wherein the first substantially conical volume is bounded by a first substantially conical surface that is tangent to respective vertices of the drawable payload in the three-dimensional model; (c) determining whether the virtual camera is located within a second substantially conical volume in the three-dimensional environment, wherein the second substantially conical volume: (i) has an apex located at an origin of the curved three-dimensional model and (ii) is bounded by a second substantially conical surface that intersects with respective vertices of the drawable payload in the three-dimensional model; (d) when the virtual camera is determined in (b) to be inside the first substantially conical volume and is determined in (c) to be outside the second substantially conical volume, culling the node; and (e) when the virtual camera is determined in (b) to be inside both the first substantially conical volume and the second substantially conical volume, rendering the drawable payload, whereby the culling (d) avoids the rendering of drawable data over a horizon of the curved three-dimensional model from the perspective of the virtual camera.