Progressive Dynamics++: A Framework for Stable, Continuous, and Consistent Animation Across Resolution and Time

The recently developed Progressive Dynamics framework [Zhang et al. 2024] addresses the long-standing challenge in enabling rapid iterative design for high-fidelity cloth and shell animation. In this work, we identify fundamental limitations of the original method in terms of stability and temporal continuity. For robust progressive dynamics simulation we seek methods that provide: (1) stability across all levels of detail (LOD) and timesteps, (2) temporally continuous animations without jumps or jittering, and (3) user-controlled balancing between geometric consistency and enrichment at each timestep, thereby making it a practical previewing tool with high-quality results at the finest level to be used as the final output. We propose a general framework, Progressive Dynamics++, for constructing a family of progressive dynamics integration methods that advance physical simulation states forward in both time and spatial resolution, which includes Zhang et al. [2024]'s method as one member. We analyze necessary stability conditions for Progressive Dynamics integrators and introduce a novel, stable method that significantly improves temporal continuity, supported by a new quantitative measure. Additionally, we present a quantitative analysis of the trade-off between geometric consistency and enrichment, along with strategies for balancing between these aspects in transitions across resolution and time.