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# getHeight() for TIN terrains

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Hi, I have added TIN terrains to my engine. The terrain is subdivided with a quad tree, and culling, rendering works great. I'm now trying to put together a fast getHeight() function. I got to the point where I loop through the node triangles and perform a 2d point test, to see if the point (x,z) actually lies within the triangle. Now I need to calculate the height/penetration at that location, and that's where I, again, get stuck. Supplied are the three triangle vertices (x,y,z), and the point (x,y,z) that may lie above or below the triangle surface. I don't really have a clue what to do next... I know this is very much like a ray-tri test, but can't it be simplified/optimized since it works vertical only? Any hints, links etc.?

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Quote:
 Original post by remdulI know this is very much like a ray-tri test, but can't it be simplified/optimized since it works vertical only?
Sure. This has been covered recently, but in short, just plug the x and y values into the plane equation for the triangle and solve for z. (Or solve for y using x and z if y is up...)

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I still don't understand what I'm supposed to do. I read a few recent topics about similar problems here, but I'm not sure I'm doing the same.

I'm doing something similar to this:

http://www.merl.com/papers/docs/TR96-17.pdf#search=%22MERL-TR-96-17%22

Except that that paper doesn't go into retrieving the height value I think, and if it does, I don't understand.

Hmm, not even sure what I'm looking for...

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If you have the triangle to test against, this is really quite easy.

Calculate the plane equation of the triangle from the three points, r.n = d, where n=(v1-v0)×(v2-v0) and d=v0.n.

Then find the z value for which the line is on the plane. This is a line-plane collision, but since the line is axis aligned you can calculate h directly as:
h=d-(xnx+yny).

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// Returns the height above a triangle.  z axis is up.float HeightAtXY(float x, float y, t_Vec3 *v1, t_Vec3 *v2, t_Vec3 *v3) {  float q, u, v, w;  // Calculate the barycentric weights and use them to find the height at the x,y location  q = (v2->x - v1->x) * (v3->y - v1->y) -      (v3->x - v1->x) * (v2->y - v1->y);  if (q == 0)    return v1->z;				// Bad triangle, but at least return something...  q = 1.0 / q;  u = q * ((v2->x - x) * (v3->y - y) - (v3->x - x) * (v2->y - y));  v = q * ((v3->x - x) * (v1->y - y) - (v1->x - x) * (v3->y - y));  w = q * ((v1->x - x) * (v2->y - y) - (v2->x - x) * (v1->y - y));  return u * v1->z + v * v2->z + w * v3->z;}