Constructing PDE-based surfaces bounded by geodesics or lines of curvature

In order to explore a new approach to construct surfaces bounded by geodesics or lines of curvature, a method of surface modeling based on fourth-order partial differential equations (PDEs) is presented. Compared with the free-form surface modeling based on finding control points, PDE-based surface modeling has the following three advantages. First, the corresponding biharmonic surface can naturally be derived under some degenerative conditions; second, the parameters in the PDE implicate some physical meaning, such as elasticity or rigidity; third, there are only a few parameters that need to be evaluated, and hence the computation is simple. In addition, this paper constructs two adjacent surfaces with C1 continuity whose common boundary is the same given curve as well as respective geodesic (or line of curvature). Examples show that this method to construct PDE-based surfaces bounded by geodesics or lines of curvature is easy and effective. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.