How do I get the normal of each triangle in mesh?

Hi,

I have some problem with getting a normal vector of each triangle in a mesh(Also the startPoint of that vector too. I mean the center point between a three vertice that make this triangle and the normal from that point).

I know that I can access mesh.normals but I think this isn't the normal from a center of each triangle right?


Thank you : )

 

Mathematically, if you think of a triangle being made of points P1, P2, P3, you do the normalized Cross Product of P1 to P2, and P1 to P3. There is a Vector3.Cross() function to help with that.

It's been a while but that should give you the normal.

The center point is just the average position of P1, P2 and P3 or ((P1 + P2 + P3) / 3).

 

Thank you a lot! Ntero for the mathematically calculation

How about if I have a series of vertice in mesh.vertices
and I Don't really know that which 3 vertices in those vertice series will relate to each other and produce a triangle?

is there is a way to find out this issue?

 

In the Mesh, you have a triangle list. [0, 1, 2, 1, 2, 3, 2, 3, 4, 2, 4, 5]

This list is broken up into sets of 3, so the triangle list really reads like this:

[[0, 1, 2] [1, 2, 3][2, 3, 4][2, 4, 5]]

So pull out 3 indexes from every 3 in the integer array. This is your triangle indexing.

In the vertices of the mesh, you have a series of Vector3's. Each item in that array, corresponds to a triangle index.

Same goes for normals (Vector3's) and UV's (Vector2's)... and colors and tangents and whatever else is there.

So, your answer is.

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. P1=vertices[triangles[triangle* 3]]
3. P2=vertices[triangles[triangle * 3 + 1]]
4. P3=vertices[triangles[triangle * 3 + 1]]
5.  
6. center = ((P1 + P2 + P3) / 3)
7.  
8. P1=normals[triangles[triangle * 3]]
9. P2=normals[triangles[triangle * 3 + 1]]
10. P3=normals[triangles[triangle * 3 + 2]]
11.  
12. faceNormal=((P1 + P2 + P3) / 3)
13.  

 

The mesh.Triangles is your index list. It lists Vertex indices in groups of 3.

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. //Mesh data calls can be VERY expensive so cache it first
3. Vector3 verts = mesh.vertices;
4. int indices = mesh.triangles;
5. for(int in = 0; i < mesh.triangles.Length;)
6. {
7. Vector3 P1 = verts[indices[i++]];
8. Vector3 P2 = verts[indices[i++]];
9. Vector3 P3 = verts[indices[i++]];
10. }
11.  

Loop through the indices and then get the vertices that the current indices point to to get each individual triangle point.

Note: BigMisterB the Vertices in vertices can be reused and are not necessarily sorted based on the triangles. You need to go through mesh.triangles to get the proper vertex indices for each triangle.

 

Sorry, I know that part, just skipped over it.. lol

 

Hey, Thank you BigMisterB and Ntero

This solve my problem : )
At first I see the mesh.triangle but I don't know what the return value int[] really is

now you make me understand it better, Thank again for your help.

 

this was hell of a useful post, i was wondering the exact same myself

thank you all