Are there any libraries that can generate a 3D mesh from a 3D array of data?

Question

I am trying to write some code that takes some data, puts it into a 3-dimensional array, and then generates a 3D mesh for rendering. The data is a list of tiles with fields for defining the tile's type, etc. I am using Irrlicht for graphics right now and it has ways to manipulate the vertices/indices of a mesh but I can't come up with a fast, efficient way to do it. Are there any libraries or examples of how to do this that anyone knows of?

Answer 1

You want Delaunay triangulation. There are some links at the end of the wikipedia entry. I have used CGAL once for this, but it was quite painful. Note that the problem is particularly ill-conditioned, and you do need a library: CGAL uses some exact arithmetic tricks, hence its cumbersomeness.

Don't do this yourself.

In case you want mesh generation of the convex hull, CGAL provides it too (cumbersome too).

Answer 2

It's unclear what exactly you mean by a 3D array of data, but I guess that you're searching for marching cubes algorithm. It's pretty easy to implement yourself but probably you can find an open-source implementation.

Answer 3

If it's a fully 3D (with internal volumes and intersecting faces) then you need marching cubes or marching tetrahedra

But if it's 2.5D (ie xy and depth/height) then it's much quicker to do a 2D delauney triangulation on the XY - the best and fastest implementation is triangle but it's not free for commercial use