Spline joints for multibody dynamics

Abstract

Spline joints are a novel class of joints that can model general scleronomic constraints for multibody dynamics based on the minimal-coordinates formulation. The main idea is to introduce spline curves and surfaces in the modeling of joints: We model 1-DOF joints using splines on SE(3), and construct multi-DOF joints as the product of exponentials of splines in Euclidean space. We present efficient recursive algorithms to compute the derivatives of the spline joint, as well as geometric algorithms to determine optimal parameters in order to achieve the desired joint motion. Our spline joints can be used to create interesting new simulated mechanisms for computer animation and they can more accurately model complex biomechanical joints such as the knee and shoulder.