If you were familiar with those formats, you would guess the answer.
STL is just a set of triangles (coded by their 3 vertices) while IGES normally stores exact geometry (NURBS, conics, etc). So, straightforward conversion is impossible (I don't mean translating each triangle as a separate surface what is basically useless).
If you know some semantics around STL vertices (e.g. a cloud of points belonging to a single surface) then you could try to reverse-engineer first (i.e. reconstructing surfaces) and then converting to IGES. Both steps are possible with Open CASCADE.
What tools from Open CASCADE could you recommend to reconstruct surface from point cloud? Do you mean "Surfaces from Scattered Points" component or something else?
For commercial users I would suggest favoring "Surfaces from Scattered Points" indeed (within Value-Added software section). It justifies its price (very reasonable, imho) in terms of speed and quality gain.
For freebies the *Plate* packages (see OCC distribution) can perhaps be acceptable. IIRC, the Plate sample has some reconstruction use case.
Of course, other techniques such as GeomAPI_PointsToBSplineSurface, GeomFill, etc can suit for particular cases (e.g. the former - for grid of points).
Mon, 03/28/2005 - 21:31
Hi John,
If you were familiar with those formats, you would guess the answer.
STL is just a set of triangles (coded by their 3 vertices) while IGES normally stores exact geometry (NURBS, conics, etc). So, straightforward conversion is impossible (I don't mean translating each triangle as a separate surface what is basically useless).
If you know some semantics around STL vertices (e.g. a cloud of points belonging to a single surface) then you could try to reverse-engineer first (i.e. reconstructing surfaces) and then converting to IGES. Both steps are possible with Open CASCADE.
Hope this helps.
Roman
Tue, 03/29/2005 - 10:45
Hello, Roman!
What tools from Open CASCADE could you recommend to reconstruct surface from point cloud? Do you mean "Surfaces from Scattered Points" component or something else?
Thanks.
Wed, 03/30/2005 - 22:50
Hello Oleg,
For commercial users I would suggest favoring "Surfaces from Scattered Points" indeed (within Value-Added software section). It justifies its price (very reasonable, imho) in terms of speed and quality gain.
For freebies the *Plate* packages (see OCC distribution) can perhaps be acceptable. IIRC, the Plate sample has some reconstruction use case.
Of course, other techniques such as GeomAPI_PointsToBSplineSurface, GeomFill, etc can suit for particular cases (e.g. the former - for grid of points).
Roman
Fri, 04/15/2005 - 09:53
Thank you.