Hi all, I've been contacted by Prof. Tao Ju, University St Louis. http://www1.cse.wustl.edu/~taoju/
He offered Blender Foundation to use algorithms and code he developed the past years. It's based on his 2002 Siggraph paper: http://www1.cse.wustl.edu/~taoju/research/dualContour.pdf He further worked on that, resulting in this program: http://www1.cse.wustl.edu/~taoju/code/polymender.htm It also has an improved method for creating meshes out of volumes, preserving detail: example of a marching cube metaball scene: http://reocities.com/SiliconValley/port/3456/isosurf/png/demo1.png the same metaball scene in dual contouring: http://reocities.com/SiliconValley/port/3456/isosurf/png/demo2.png His assistant Jean-Denis Boudreault wrote me: "If blender wishes to push the envelope even further, it could enter a whole new area of modeling paradigm, in which dual contouring would be the key. for example, the 3d modeling software http://www.3d-coat.com/ uses a voxel data approach for advanced neo-modeling of polygon free meshes. Blender could enhance it's metaball system with dual contouring to make it's entry in the voxel based modeling world in style. all this is only the start an overhaul of the metaball system can offer. With dual contouring, you now have the proper tools to do it." When I wrote back about possible implementation of CSG meshing, he wrote: "As for CSG operations, I was not aware that they were not included in the above code. But im sure the talented Blender developers shall know how to re implement it if necessary. If this can help, i include code from an independent experimental implementation of dual contouring that is available as open source on the internet (http://reocities.com/SiliconValley/port/3456/isosurf/isosurfaces.html ). Now i am not aware if the code is usable by blender as is (and im convinced Mr. Ju's code is preferable anyways), but it can surely be used as an example implementation of CSG operations, from which the developers can triangulate the algorithms into Mr. Ju's code." The code for dualcontouring and polymender is here: http://download.blender.org/demo/test/dc.zip It is still (c) by the creator. He has agreed on transferring to this to (c) for BF, but with keeping his contribution credit. Anyone interested in following up on this is welcome! I'd need feedback from experienced developers what do with it precisely. In case there's someone who can (wants to) bring this in Blender, Tao Ju is more than willing to assist or give feedback too. Thanks, -Ton- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ton Roosendaal Blender Foundation t...@blender.org www.blender.org Blender Institute Entrepotdok 57A 1018AD Amsterdam The Netherlands _______________________________________________ Bf-committers mailing list Bf-committers@blender.org http://lists.blender.org/mailman/listinfo/bf-committers