wjakob/instant-meshes

Interactive field-aligned mesh generator

Instant Meshes

This repository contains the interactive meshing software developed as part of the publication

Instant Field-Aligned Meshes
Wenzel Jakob, Marco Tarini, Daniele Panozzo, Olga Sorkine-Hornung
In ACM Transactions on Graphics (Proceedings of SIGGRAPH Asia 2015)
PDF, Video, Project page

In commercial software

Since version 10.2, Modo uses the Instant Meshes algorithm to implement its automatic retopology feature. An interview discussing this technique and more recent projects is available here.

Screenshot

Pre-compiled binaries

The following binaries (Intel, 64 bit) are automatically generated from the latest GitHub revision.

Microsoft Windows
Mac OS X
Linux

Please also fetch the following dataset ZIP file and extract it so that the datasets folder is in the same directory as Instant Meshes, Instant Meshes.app, or Instant Meshes.exe.

Datasets

Note: On Linux, Instant Meshes relies on the program zenity, which must be installed.

Compiling

Compiling from scratch requires CMake and a recent version of XCode on Mac, Visual Studio 2015 on Windows, and GCC on Linux.

On MacOS, compiling should be as simple as

git clone --recursive https://github.com/wjakob/instant-meshes
cd instant-meshes
cmake .
make -j 4

To build on Linux, please install the prerequisites libxrandr-dev, libxinerama-dev, libxcursor-dev, and libxi-dev and then use the same sequence of commands shown above for MacOS.

On Windows, open the generated file InstantMeshes.sln after step 3 and proceed building as usual from within Visual Studio.

Usage

To get started, launch the binary and select a dataset using the "Open mesh" button on the top left (the application must be located in the same directory as the 'datasets' folder, otherwise the panel will be empty).

The standard workflow is to solve for an orientation field (first blue button) and a position field (second blue button) in sequence, after which the 'Export mesh' button becomes active. Many user interface elements display a descriptive message when hovering the mouse cursor above for a second.

A range of additional information about the input mesh, the computed fields, and the output mesh can be visualized using the check boxes accessible via the 'Advanced' panel.

Clicking the left mouse button and dragging rotates the object; right-dragging (or shift+left-dragging) translates, and the mouse wheel zooms. The fields can also be manipulated using brush tools that are accessible by clicking the first icon in each 'Tool' row.

instant-meshes's Issues

Integration with Blender?

Hi

I am wondering if you have any plans to integrate this into Blender. We are missing a good meshes in Blender and this would be such a nice start for everyone who is involved with Blender.

thanks

32 bit linux compiles, but faces missing when wanting to export.

Hi, see above.
Can someone send me a 32 bit linux or windows build so that i can test again.
64 bit linux works as expected and 64 bit windows version not.
Also in 32 bit version gui is missing images.
regards bluedxca93

Could not initialize GLFW

When running the compiled version of it i get above error. (using Win 10 btw).

batch process

Hi,
Awesome Product!
As I have a lot of meshes that all need the exact same treatment, (just set the target vertex count to 200K and solve/export it).
I would like to know if there is a way to tell instance mesh to do that per command line.
Is that already possible?
Thanks in advance!

Crashed

Hello
i tried windows version ; when i saved the object always the application force closed and also i can't open obj files
i have windows 10 64bits

write file failure (starts to write continuously a huge file)

Experiencing problem saving meshes, some times it starts to write huge files for a small resulting mesh, and never stops writing a file, like 2-10 GB per file, until i stop it with task manager. Have this issue on 3 different PCs. Resulting files actually have a resulting mesh, but also some garbage points, if i open it in ZBrush, it says there are unused points, and asks to delete them, after i save a file with ZBrush, the file size reduced dramatically, 4GB-> 50 MB. So some how it writes dumb data into exported obj

Crash when increasing target vertex count

Steps

Using build: Visual Studio 2015 / Win32 / RelWithDebInfo

1. Load this mesh. Notice that Target vertex count is: 60.12K;
2. Increase Target vertex count to >100K (110.05K to be precise);
3. Wait for a few seconds as the program loads and processes the mesh.

Result

Instant Meshes crashes. Visual studio shows this dialog:

Unhandled exception at 0x00F8801E in Instant Meshes.exe: Fatal program exit requested.

Console window shows:

Caught exception in event handler: bad allocation

Notes:

• Computer does not run out of memory.
• Why is there no 64bit configuration in the .sln?

Call stack

Instant Meshes.exe!abort() Line 77  C++
Instant Meshes.exe!nanogui::Screen::mouseButtonCallbackEvent(int button, int action, int modifiers) Line 500    C++
Instant Meshes.exe!<lambda_d39877562765bc0d3052e6c01bd928d1>::<lambda_invoker_cdecl>(GLFWwindow * w, int button, int action, int modifiers) Line 166    C++
Instant Meshes.exe!_glfwInputMouseClick(_GLFWwindow * window, int button, int action, int mods) Line 192    C
Instant Meshes.exe!windowProc(HWND__ * hWnd, unsigned int uMsg, unsigned int wParam, long lParam) Line 438  C
[External Code] 
[Frames below may be incorrect and/or missing, no symbols loaded for user32.dll]    
Instant Meshes.exe!_glfwPlatformPollEvents() Line 995   C
Instant Meshes.exe!nanogui::mainloop(int refresh) Line 102  C++
Instant Meshes.exe!main(int argc, char * * argv) Line 213   C++
[External Code] 

would it be possible to make a build for older glibc on Linux?

Currently there is a dependency on C++11 which brings in a dependency on a later glibc than is available in CentOS 6.2 which is what we are currently locked into in my place of employment.

Would it be possible to negate the need for this?

That being said it compiled without a hitch on OSX 10.11 at home.

Question more than issue: uv coordinates

Really impressive results!

Something I wondered reading the paper pdf :

"The second step (Section 3.3) computes a local,
per-vertex (u, v)-parameterization, which is discontinuous over
edges (a direct visualization is shown in Figure 2(c))."

Wouldn't it be useful to export the results of that parameterization as uv coords on the result mesh? Even though you state it's discontinuous over edges, and even when resulting in multiple overlapping uv islands / domains, feels like it could be a really useful first step in manual uv layout? Thinking especially about architecture examples, where it usually starts with best plane or tri planar projection. a very rough first step, and having used about every uv layout tool, where the initial picks for discontinuities / seams seems usually poor from the user point of view (usually based on a generic normal to projection direction angle threshold rather than local surface smoothness).

Compliation failed!

I followed the instructions for making sure that the packages and datasets are in the correct place but when I try to compile the program it falls over with the following response...

[code]cp66@cp66-desktop:~/instant-meshes$ make -j 4
[ 2%] Built target bin2c
Scanning dependencies of target tbb_static
[ 15%] Built target glfw_objects
[ 16%] Built target glfw
[ 16%] Building CXX object ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/common.cpp.o
[ 17%] Building CXX object ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/glutil.cpp.o
[ 18%] Building CXX object ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/widget.cpp.o
[ 19%] Building CXX object ext_build/tbb/CMakeFiles/tbb_static.dir/src/tbb/tbb_misc.cpp.o
In file included from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/include/nanogui/opengl.h:34:0,
from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/src/common.cpp:18:
/home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/ext/glfw/include/GLFW/glfw3.h:168:21: fatal error: GL/gl.h: No such file or directory
compilation terminated.
ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/build.make:144: recipe for target 'ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/common.cpp.o' failed
make[2]: *** [ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/common.cpp.o] Error 1
make[2]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
In file included from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/include/nanogui/opengl.h:34:0,
from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/include/nanogui/glutil.h:15,
from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/src/glutil.cpp:12:
/home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/ext/glfw/include/GLFW/glfw3.h:168:21: fatal error: GL/gl.h: No such file or directory
compilation terminated.
ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/build.make:120: recipe for target 'ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/glutil.cpp.o' failed
make[2]: *** [ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/glutil.cpp.o] Error 1
In file included from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/include/nanogui/opengl.h:34:0,
from /home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/src/widget.cpp:16:
/home/cp66/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/ext/glfw/include/GLFW/glfw3.h:168:21: fatal error: GL/gl.h: No such file or directory
compilation terminated.
ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/build.make:168: recipe for target 'ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/widget.cpp.o' failed
make[2]: *** [ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/src/widget.cpp.o] Error 1
CMakeFiles/Makefile2:130: recipe for target 'ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/all' failed
make[1]: *** [ext_build/nanogui/CMakeFiles/nanogui-obj.dir/all] Error 2
make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
[ 20%] Linking CXX static library libtbb_static.a
[ 53%] Built target tbb_static
Makefile:127: recipe for target 'all' failed
make: *** [all] Error 2
[/code]

I am running an Ubuntu 16.10 PC that is fully up to date and I have triple checked that the file glfw3.h that results in the first error is indeed there so I don't know what I can do to get this program working, please help me!

high GPU usage in windows

Hi Wenzel,
When I use Instant mesh on a laptop, it draws my battery to 5% in 30minutes. At home, I monitored with GPU-Z on a 280X under windows. It shows that instant mesh uses 80% CPU just by moving the mouse over the GUI. It happens with or without any data loaded.
Configuration: Win 7 x64, AMD R9 280X, latest Catalyst (15.11), GPUZ 0.8.6
Regards

OS X version issue

"You have OS X 10.10.5. The application requieres OS X 10.11 or later."

Seriously? I cannot use de .app but I don't have the time or knowledge or the space in my hard-disk to download two softwares and compile...

Please, some help!

Question: Standalone Library?

Wonderful you guys, thanks for sharing your research in such an accessible way!

I was wondering if there's a way to build a standalone library for this functionality? That'd make it easier to include the tools in other programs, or even wrap it in a Python library.

Would that be a ton of work, or is a lot of the groundwork already there?

Cheers!

Instant Meshes

Hi,

Is it possible to run instant meshes from .NET - C#?

I saw that there is implementation in python but in my software I cannot use any numpy library as it is ironpython.

Kind Regards,
Petras

topology flow

Hi Wenzel,
Nice to see you on a new project. First tests look really promising. You can follow a pretty active discussion here http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?385344-Instant-field-aligned-meshes (2 pages in one day). Some test over there show that the topology flow analysis could be improved. Zremesher for example offers better results "out of the box". Maybe there are some way to improve this in instant meshes? Many of us will be happy to help test and give files and feedback.
Thank you for sharing high quality product again with us. I hope you also find some time to finish a release of mitsuba with all the latest improvements.
Regards,
mirlip

Opportunity - Point Cloud import from laserscans?

Hi,

Have you considered importing point clouds directly? Is that something you could support?
E.g. import E57 files.

We need to mesh laserscan data with a clean topology and most meshing tools out there do not create clean meshes. We currently would need to
a) use meshing software to convert point cloud to mesh
b) export mesh to OBJ
c) instant-meshes coverts mesh to point cloud to create clean topology
d) export mesh to OBJ

Maybe you could use the point cloud straight out. There is also some opportunity around texturing.

Keep boundary edges and only change internal topology?

Hi, this is great software, can you please add boundary edges option? Let's say I have a cube and when I retopo this cube edges on this cube doesn't look straight anymore and cube can look like a sphere after retopo, it would be good to have "Force to keep boundary edges" option while retopo.

Thank you.

License says something silly

The license contains a nonstandard clause, containing this text:

"then you hereby grant the following license:"

This clause doesn't make any sense. You can't cause somebody else to grant a license by declaring that they've done so, any more than I can cause you to buy me a pizza by saying "by replying to this bug report you hereby agree to buy me a pizza". I'd suggest sticking to the standard BSD license that thousands of projects use, and not making ad-hoc changes to it.

(This is feedback rather than a bug report, but unfortunately GitHub gives users no way of communicating with projects other than filing bugs.)

maya style view navigation?

would it be possible to implement a maya-style view navigation? it is enough of an industry standard that most 3D folk should be very familiar with it. it is also very tablet friendly - and tablet is best for drawing the guides in instant meshes.

Spline (or bezier curves) as brushes (feature request)

First of all biggest thanx for this amazing open-source app!

After playing with your app. Found that not so easy draw guide (brushes) with mouse.
All commercial retopo tools provide spline drawing for similar task. So may be possible, add this feature to new version of instant-meshes?

Thank you,
And best regards

Tool Crash - Win10

Hi,

I am working on a model of around 700K poly and the tool works fine until i try to export the final mesh.

Am i missing something?

Thank You

Zoom with Ctrl+Left mouse

I have 2 mouse button. I need zoom in/zoom out. Thanks.

Support for adaptive mesh generation

Hello @wjakob

I have seen in your published paper that you talk about custom metrics(figure 22) I am wondering if this is possible with the current implementation of this tool. I am interested more in mean curvature support.
It makes sense for organic meshes if you want to generate a very low poly topology. Thanks!

Could not initialize GLFW

When launching the Windows binary I get this error:

"Caught a fatal error: Could not initialize GLFW"

The console output says:

"Running in GI mode, start with -h for instructions on batch mode.\nGLFW error 65544: No monitors found"

Possibly helpful/relevant: I'm running Windows 10 with a GTX 760 on drivers 359.00

Symmetry?

First of all, congratulations to the authors and thank you very much for providing such a nice application in addition to the paper!

Is there a way to encourage symmetry in the remeshed result? This would reduce the need for local adjustments by half and also result in a mesh that is much easier to process further downstream (e.g. rigging, skinning).

Again, great work!

Not starting up on Windows 7

I get this error whenever I try to start it on windows:

Running in GUI mode, start with -h for instructions on batch mode.
Compiling shaders .. Linker error (mesh_shader_63):

Geometry info

0(28) : warning C7050: "frag.to_eye" might be used before being initialized
0(28) : warning C7050: "frag.to_light" might be used before being initialized
0(28) : warning C7050: "frag.texcoord" might be used before being initialized
0(28) : warning C7050: "frag.color" might be used before being initialized

Link info

error: type mismatch for varying parameter (named fData.to_eye) between shader s
tages
error: type mismatch for varying parameter (named fData.to_light) bet

Mesh isn't showing(Windows Build)

I just downloaded the windows build. When I try to open a mesh it says it has been opened and all the functions at like the mesh is there ,but the mesh isn't visible. Don't think it's something with my computer, cause other 3D programs work fine ,but can't determine the cause since there is just one version to download.

Remove unnecessary null pointer checks

An extra null pointer check is not needed in functions like the following.

• batch_process
• Viewer

GPU init failure

I start instant meshes on remote server, and there is 4 graphics adapters, so, because of remote server connection , the first adapter in a row is Microsoft Basic Video Adapted, and it has no OpenGL, but there is another GPU in a sytem Nvidia GTX 960, it has a proper OpenGL version and works fine with other software in a system, but Instant-Meshes could not see this GPU, and does not start because of it. Could you please implement some tweak to be able to choose which GPU to use, or at least give your software a possibility to look for another GPU in a system, not only first one in a list ? Please help !!

File extension error on output

When exporting a file, if extension not typed into the textbox then your output routine thinks the last 4 chars are the extension and returns an error. Note that this is in Windows 10, which may be the issue (Issue passing the desired extension from the GUI to the output string?)

For example: Example instead of Example.obj

Results in:

Crash when loading application state

Steps

Using 64-bit binary found on GitHub

1. Load this mesh;
2. Solve orientation and position fields;
3. Extract mesh;
4. Save application state.

Using build: Visual Studio 2015 / Win32 / Debug

1. Load previously saved application state.

The reason why I'm not using my own build for saving the application state is that my build crashes when saving the application state. I get the same output as below in the console.

Result

Instant Meshes crashes; a popup says: "Abort() has been called".

This is outputted in the console:

Caught exception in event handler: bad allocation at end of load

Callstack

Instant Meshes.exe!issue_debug_notification(const wchar_t * const message) Line 125 C++
Instant Meshes.exe!__acrt_report_runtime_error(const wchar_t * message) Line 142    C++
Instant Meshes.exe!abort() Line 51  C++
Instant Meshes.exe!nanogui::Screen::mouseButtonCallbackEvent(int button, int action, int modifiers) Line 501    C++
Instant Meshes.exe!nanogui::Screen::{ctor}::__l2::<lambda>(GLFWwindow * w, int button, int action, int modifiers) Line 166  C++
Instant Meshes.exe!void <lambda>(GLFWwindow *, int, int, int)::<lambda_invoker_cdecl>(GLFWwindow * w, int button, int action, int modifiers) Line 166   C++
Instant Meshes.exe!_glfwInputMouseClick(_GLFWwindow * window, int button, int action, int mods) Line 192    C
Instant Meshes.exe!windowProc(HWND__ * hWnd, unsigned int uMsg, unsigned int wParam, long lParam) Line 434  C
[External Code] 
[Frames below may be incorrect and/or missing, no symbols loaded for user32.dll]    
Instant Meshes.exe!_glfwPlatformPollEvents() Line 1013  C
Instant Meshes.exe!_glfwPlatformWaitEvents() Line 1061  C
Instant Meshes.exe!glfwWaitEvents() Line 696    C
Instant Meshes.exe!nanogui::mainloop(int refresh) Line 102  C++
Instant Meshes.exe!main(int argc, char * * argv) Line 211   C++
[External Code] 

Removes uv sets

When I import an obj, it removes all of the uv sets I previously had, making it unusable if I ever want to apply high poly textures to it that contained multiple UV sets.

Export building oversized files seemingly forever

Hi there,

first of all, incredible tool. I found it when looking for retopo tool that can go above the conventional limit of other tools (Zremesher=100k poly), since I need to retain detail of complicated photoscanned meshes bit better.
It loads my files well, it's super fast ( 60 million poly mesh loads for few minutes but then retopos under single minute on my dual-xeon/titan-x; decimated 10 mil poly mesh takes the whole process in mere seconds...).
Everything goes well until I try to export anything else then the data sets that come with it. It builds large .obj files forever. I've noticed some people reported that on youtube and reply it could be fixed, but I downloaded the latest binary today (Windows 10, 64bit).

Example of mesh I am processing.

I have the feeling the issue might be a bit in the dirtyness of the files, they end up with lot of irregularities, but sadly this is how the files are created by RealityCapturePro, state of art tool for photogrammetry (it creates meshes directly, not dense pointclouds, so can't try that option). Due to their size it's almost impossible to clean them even in Meshlab so I am suprised how well this tool handles it. Until that export :- ).

If possible, I have private WeTransfer link I can send to email ( it's rather large files but again, it's processed incredibly swiftly).

This tool is almost dream come true, would be great if this could be possible to be solved.

Thank you,

Juraj
talcikdemovicova.com

Error loading .ply file created with CloudCompare

I'm using the Windows 64 bit build on Win7/64, 32GB RAM. I exported a .ply point cloud file from CloudCompare: https://www.dropbox.com/s/hlavw11ekv9be51/market_reduced%20-%20Cloudsubsetbinary.ply?dl=0

However, when I try to import this, I get the error message "does not contain vertex indices".

There aren't any options in CloudCompare to add vertex indices -- what is going wrong?

Thanks,

Eliot

unlisted/unincluded dependencies

In order to build Instant Meshes on Ubuntu 16.04 I had to install the following packages:

libxrand-dev
libxinerama-dev
xcursor-dev
libxi-dev

I was warned that I needed the first 3 when running cmake but the last one not until the build failed.

Build in windows

Hi Wenzel,

I like the great software, but I have errors when building in windows. Does it need the Nano-GUI or libgl precompiled?

Look forward to your reply!

Best,
Changjian

Do not loading mesh at all

After opening mesh (any, even from dataset) I see empty space.
Win 7 x64, binary version is downloaded here

Zoom extents/view mesh

I have a georeferenced mesh that I've worked on in Meshlab (about 2 million points). when I open it in Instant Meshes, I get no error messages, everything seems to have worked, but there's nothing visible in the viewport. I'm not sure if it's because the mesh is located at coordinates that would be far from 0,0 or some other issue.

Build issue on linux

When I tried to build the program on linux, the terminal puts out an error and fails:

/instant_meshes/src/common.h:97:27: error: exponent has no digits
#define RCPOVERFLOW_FLT    0x1p-128f

I googled this and found that by changing the line
set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS} -std=c++11")
to
set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS} -std=gnu++11")
in the CMakeLists.txt, I was able to get the program to build successfully.

Also, I figured out that installing zenity is required for making some parts of your GUI work, but it wasn't mentioned in your README.

Unable to load mesh

I keep getting an error "Could not parse unsigned integer''". Couldn't find any reference as to what this means?

Please recheck the linux dependency notes in the README file

On Linux Mint 18 (uses same repositories like Ubuntu 16.06 for which I assume the instructions were made):

• There's no libxrand-dev package, but a libxrandr-dev
• There's no xcursor-dev package, but a libxcursor-dev

The other packages from this README section do exist for Linux Mint 18

Could not initialize GLFW

Just tried to use for the first time after downloading and when the window opens, it gives a "GLFW error 65544: No monitors found" error. The error box pops up with Caught a fatal error: Could not initialize GLFW!

Any suggestions?

Error while compiling on Arch Linux

: required from here
/home/rastamanking/Portables/instant meshes LINUX/instant-meshes/ext/nanogui/ext/eigen/Eigen/src/Core/DenseCoeffsBase.h:56:30: warning: ignoring attributes on template argument ‘Eigen::internal::packet_traits::type {aka __vector(4) float}’ [-Wignored-attributes]
make[1]: *** [CMakeFiles/Makefile2:70: CMakeFiles/InstantMeshes.dir/all] Error 2
make: *** [Makefile:128: all] Error 2

when running "make -j 4"

Meshlab shows exported mesh a triangle mesh?

Not sure this is an issue with instant-mesh or Meshlab, but exporting a remeshed result from instant-mesh as PLY or OBJ will produce a triangles-only mesh in Meshlab. The quad layout is preserved but all quads are triangulated.

crash when reducing window on win7

Hi,
When reducing the instant mesh window on Win7x64, the program crashes. Error message in console is "Caught exception in event handler: Could not create framebuffer object!"

Cannot load a certain point cloud

Hi,

Daniele showed me how to play around with Instant Meshes to remesh a point cloud, by loading .aln files. However, I have a model which I am unable to load and I don't know why. The file is loaded but the application doesn't show anything. See the file data.tar.gz for the actual files. I am able to load and visualize bunny.aln, but I am unable to load dragon.aln. Both reference only one .ply file, which is a point cloud, without triangles, encoded in binary with normal information. Both meshes have been normalized to a unit box as well.

GLFW error 65544: No monitors found, Win10 64bit

When executing "Instant Meshes.exe"

Help viewport

Hello everyone, I've a issue whit the tool!

I try to "open mesh" and import a project but in viewport nothing appears!

I try running the program also whit GUI mode, but is the same...

can You help me please....

Save dialog appears behind application under Ubuntu

The Export Mesh/Save dialog appears to pop up behind the application under Ubuntu, making it appear that the application has hung, especially if the application is full screen when the Save is selected. I ran the app from a Terminal window under Ubuntu 14.04 64-bit using the downloadable binaries (not locally compiled).

Failure to import georeferenced mesh

Hello,

I've tried to import a georeferenced mesh (*.obj) in your software but it crashes during the import step with this error (full log - source file) :

• CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (Caught exceptio... bad allocation:String) [], RemoteException
• FullyQualifiedErrorId : NativeCommandError

Is the coordinate space used too big for Instant Mesh ?