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6.3.4 Higher order derivative vector

The algorithm introduced in Sect. 6.3.3 to compute the third order derivative vector of the intersection curve can be generalized to compute the higher order derivative vectors , under the assumption that we have evaluated for , and for . The algorithm is as follows:
  1. Evaluate the - ( ) order derivative vector by successively differentiating (6.5). At each differentiation step replace , , and by , , and using the Frenet-Serret formulae (2.56), which leads to the equation
        (6.47)

    where , and are the coefficients that depend exclusively on and and their derivatives (see (6.10), (6.13) for reference). As we will see in step 2, it is not necessary to evaluate and . The coefficient consists of , and their derivatives of order up to and , respectively, which have already been evaluated in the earlier stages of the computation. For example , , , can be obtained by taking the dot product between the curve derivative vectors with or , thus from (6.5), (6.10) and (6.13):
        (6.48)
        (6.49)
        (6.50)
        (6.51)

  2. Replace the terms in (6.47) by since they both lie on the normal plane:
        (6.52)

  3. Evaluate by projecting , which is the - derivative of the intersection curve evaluated as a curve on a surface, onto the unit surface normal.
  4. Project (6.52) onto both the unit surface normal vectors yielding
        (6.54)

    where .
  5. Substitute and , obtained from Step 3, into (6.54), and solve the linear system for and and substitute into (6.52), resulting in
        (6.55)



Next: 6.4 Intersection curve at Up: 6.3 Transversal intersection curve Previous: 6.3.3 Torsion and third   Contents   Index
December 2009