The output of
this step is called a sparse point cloud,
consisting of the 3D coordinates of those points
that were used to align the images. Because
alignment does not require the use of all
available points in high resolution images,
typically only a small percentage of points are
used to keep the calculation times tolerable.
In the next step, all points are used to create a
high density point cloud, termed dense cloud,
that is a very close representation of the real
physical objects in the photographs. This cloud
can then be turned into a polygon mesh or
polymesh which consists of triangles that
connect the points. Color information can be
included by directly taking the color of the
various points from the photographs or by
separately calculating a texture for the mesh.
Figure 1 shows a diagram of the work process
with a recommended workflow.