The design and implementation of stereoscopic 3D scalable vector graphics based on WebKit

Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG), which is a language designed based on eXtensible Markup Language (XML), is used to describe basic shapes embedded in webpages, such as circles and rectangles. However, it can only depict 2D shapes. As a consequence, web pages using classical SVG can only display 2D shapes on a screen. With the increasing development of stereoscopic 3D (S3D) technology, binocular 3D devices have been widely used. Under this circumstance, we intend to extend the widely used web rendering engine WebKit to support the description and display of S3D webpages. Therefore, the extension of SVG is of necessity. In this paper, we will describe how to design and implement SVG shapes with stereoscopic 3D mode. Two attributes representing the depth and thickness are added to support S3D shapes. The elimination of hidden lines and hidden surfaces, which is an important process in this project, is described as well. The modification of WebKit is also discussed, which is made to support the generation of both left view and right view at the same time. As is shown in the result, in contrast to the 2D shapes generated by the Google Chrome web browser, the shapes got from our modified browser are in S3D mode. With the feeling of depth and thickness, the shapes seem to be real 3D objects away from the screen, rather than simple curves and lines as before.