APPARATUS AND METHOD TO CALCULATE RASTER DATA

A computer apparatus is disclosed for determining high quality raster data generation of scalar fields or vector fields, represented by piecewise polynomials or piecewise rational functions. It comprise one or more CPUs operative to do portions of the raster data generation algorithm, initializing sub-algorithms thereof, control the sub-algorithms, and possibly read back the generated raster data or transfer the raster data to other processors in the system. The computer apparatus further comprises one or more stream processing units operative to receive parts of the raster data algorithm from the CPUs and to execute sub-algorithms of the raster data algorithm, resulting in raster data that can be directly visualized, read back to the CPU or transferred to other processors.