How to simplify/optimize a 3d path?

Question

I have a bunch of points in 3d ( an array that contains objects with x,y,z properties ).

My problem is that there are a lot of unnecessary points as illustrated in the image bellow:

_{(source: lifesine.eu)}

How can I cleanup this path ?

At the moment the first thing that comes to mind is to

• create an array for the optimized path
• loop though all the points starting with index 1 instead of 0, and get the 'direction' for the path. If the direction changes, add the last of the two points( the current, not the previous ) to the optimized array.

The advantage is that the points are stored in a drawing order, so that makes them a path, not just random ( not sorted ) points.

Note: I am using actionscript 3, but I can understand syntax in other languages or pseudo code.

Thank you!

Answer 1

Check out Ramer-Douglas-Peucker algorithm