Area of any mesh

[jerome]

Hi people,

As this has been requested from time to time on this forum, here is a simple and fast method for computing any mesh area :

    var area = function(mesh) {
        if (!mesh) {
            return 0.0;
        }
        var indices = mesh.getIndices();
        var positions = mesh.getVerticesData(BABYLON.VertexBuffer.PositionKind);
        var v1x = 0.0;
        var v1y = 0.0;
        var v1z = 0.0;
        var v2x = 0.0;
        var v2y = 0.0;
        var v2z = 0.0;
        var crossx = 0.0;
        var crossy = 0.0;
        var crossz = 0.0;
        var ar = 0.0;
        var i1 = 0;
        var i2 = 0;
        var i3 = 0;
        var nbFaces = indices.length / 3;

        for (var i = 0; i < nbFaces; i++) {
            i1 = indices[i * 3];
            i2 = indices[i * 3 + 1];
            i3 = indices[i * 3 + 2];
            v1x = positions[i1 * 3] - positions[i2 * 3];
            v1y = positions[i1 * 3 + 1] - positions[i2 * 3 + 1];
            v1z = positions[i1 * 3 + 2] - positions[i2 * 3 + 2];
            v2x = positions[i3 * 3] - positions[i2 * 3];
            v2y = positions[i3 * 3 + 1] - positions[i2 * 3 + 1];
            v2z = positions[i3 * 3 + 2] - positions[i2 * 3 + 2];
            crossx = v1y * v2z - v1z * v2y;
            crossy = v1z * v2x - v1x * v2z;
            crossz = v1x * v2y - v1y * v2x; 
            ar = ar + Math.sqrt(crossx * crossx + crossy * crossy + crossz * crossz);
        }
        return ar * 0.5;
    };

As it doesn't allocate any object, nor calls external functions, it should be fast, GC friendly and it might be called within the render loop.

Just let me know if you want it to be integrated in BJS as a method of the class Mesh or AbstractMesh.

 

[EDIT] For experts, note that this computation could be shared and done in one line only within the method ComputeNormals() of the class VertexData just after this line : https://github.com/BabylonJS/Babylon.js/blob/master/src/Mesh/babylon.mesh.vertexData.ts#L2007  with something like :

area += length * 0.5;