A general and efficient method for finding cycles in 3D curve networks

Generating surfaces from 3D curve networks has been a longstanding problem in computer graphics. Recent attention to this area has resurfaced as a result of new sketch based modeling systems. In this work we present a new algorithm for finding cycles that bound surface patches. Unlike prior art in this area, the output of our technique is unrestricted, generating both manifold and nonmanifold geometry with arbitrary genus. The novel insight behind our method is to formulate our problem as finding local mappings at the vertices and curves of our network, where each mapping describes how incident curves are grouped into cycles. This approach lends us the efficiency necessary to present our system in an interactive design modeler, whereby the user can adjust patch constraints and change the manifold properties of curves while the system automatically re-optimizes the solution.