Mesh generation approches

general discussion
#1

Hi everyone,

I would like to start working with mesh generation, specifically generative mesh creation. From digging around I’ve found a few different approaches, so i’m hoping some of you can give me some feedback to these different methods.

Basically what I’d like to do is generatively create a mesh that could possibly have some of the following capabilities: dynamic movement of the vertices, dynamic adding and removing faces, physics interaction, able to have texture applied… etc,

Here’s a few approaches for mesh generation i’ve seen so far:

**Generating mesh from a point cloud – two subcategories with this approach: **
create mesh with triangle strips using openGL ( http://forum.openframeworks.cc/t/ofvbo-±gl-triangle-strip/7037/0 )
create mesh using ofTessellator ( http://forum.openframeworks.cc/t/how-to-use-the-oftessellator-class/6089/0 )

Generate using ofMesh and ofVbo
Two simple examples here:
https://sites.google.com/site/ofauckland/examples/draw-cube-with-ofmesh-and-ofvbo
https://sites.google.com/site/ofauckland/examples/hsb-cylinder

ofVCG and ofxGeometry addons
looks interesting but still under development…

non-OF techniques
hemesh for processing looks interesting http://www.wblut.com/2010/05/04/hemesh-a-3d-mesh-library-for-processing/

Did I miss any other approaches? Any insight or thoughts on the subject would be appreciated!

Erik

1 Like
How to generate meshes/models from points in FBO/image?
#2

I would say that you should use the ofMesh and ofVBO where possible. They’re both quite powerful and well designed and if you can leverage the core OF classes, it frees you to focus on making and manipulating robust meshes.

ofxVCG is completely paused right now, there’s some weird problems with gcc4.2 that it has that make me think it’s not quite worth the headache at the moment. ofxGeometry is way better and is built on gts (http://gts.sourceforge.net/) which is actively developed and very powerful. I’m trying to do little bits and pieces here and there when I have time but it’s not enough. I (and I’m sure Diedrick) would love to have some more help with it and would happy to take some time to chat through issues, ideas, etc.

#3

also if you find you need to use ofMesh + ofVbo you probably want to use ofVboMesh, which combine both with an easier interface. Unless you want to have more low level control over the vbo, ofVboMesh should be enough