Hello,

I'm working on visualizing some simulation data with POVRay. Since what 
I'm dealing with is a set of 3D finite-element meshes, it looks like the 
best method is to convert the surface of my mesh into a POVRay mesh of 
smooth triangles and go from there. What I've done is split the 
quadrilaterals I have into triangles and compute normal vectors with a 
bunch of cross products. This works OK, but it has some problems, such 
as the shadow line artifact. Also, I don't see any easy way to 
distribute a range of colors on the surface of the mesh to represent a 
variable (ie, pressure or velocity magnitude).

What (I think) I'd like to do is split the elements of my mesh into many 
more elements and smooth it out. I've found a few sets of macros and 
things for doing this, like the "New Surface Subdivision Suite" (
http://www.geocities.com/evilsnack/nsss.htm ) and "POV-Ray with 
Subdivision". They all seem to be unmaintained, though, or at least very 
out of date. Does anyone here have a preferred way of smoothing / 
subdividing meshes? Also, is there any experience out there in general 
with using POVRay with finite element analysis data? I know that's not 
at all what it's designed for, but I think it could be very useful for 
generating images for presentations/posters/etc. Thanks,

Jesse

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