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Civil-Comp Proceedings
ISSN 1759-3433
CCP: 56
ADVANCES IN CIVIL AND STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING COMPUTING FOR PRACTICE
Edited by: B.H.V. Topping
Paper I.1

The Visualisation of Spatial Structures with Computer Techniques

P. Huybers

Civil Engineering Department, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands

Full Bibliographic Reference for this paper
P. Huybers, "The Visualisation of Spatial Structures with Computer Techniques", in B.H.V. Topping, (Editor), "Advances in Civil and Structural Engineering Computing for Practice", Civil-Comp Press, Edinburgh, UK, pp 1-14, 1998. doi:10.4203/ccp.56.1.1
Abstract
The structural efficiency and the architectural appearance of building forms is becoming an increasingly important field of engineering, particularly because of the present wide-spread availability of computer facilities. The realisation of complex shapes comes into reach, that would not have been possible with the traditional means. In this contribution a technique is described, where structural forms are visualised starting from a geometry based on that of regular or semi-regular polyhedra, as they form the basis of most of the familiar space frame systems and of geodesic sphere subdivisions that are utilised nowadays. It appeared possible to generate these polyhedra by the rotation of regular polygons around the centre of the co-ordinate system. Related figures, that are found by derivation from these polyhedra, can be formed in a similar way by rotating planar figures that differ from ordinary polygons.

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