# wjakob/instant-meshes

Interactive field-aligned mesh generator

Repository: https://github.com/wjakob/instant-meshes
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/instant-meshes
Language: C++
License: NOASSERTION
License Family: other
Last push: 2022-01-03T03:31:55+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 32/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-02T17:46:02.011165+00:00)
- activity 0, release rhythm 35, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4006, "days_push": 1703, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_releases, no_license
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 6196, forks 703 (observed 2026-08-28T04:09:39.612082+00:00)

## What it is
Instant Meshes is an interactive field-aligned mesh generator that remeshes 3D geometry into quad or triangle meshes, based on a SIGGRAPH Asia 2015 publication. It ships as a desktop GUI application with pre-compiled binaries for Windows, macOS, and Linux, and its algorithm is also used in commercial tools like Modo's automatic retopology.

## Use cases
- remesh a 3d model into quads
- retopology for animation-ready meshes
- generate field-aligned triangle meshes from scans
- reduce polygon count of a high-poly mesh
- prepare meshes for 3d printing or sculpting
- batch remesh obj files from the command line

## When to choose
- you need fast, interactive quad-dominant remeshing of a 3D surface
- you want a free standalone tool for retopology without a full DCC suite
- you need reproducible results from a published research algorithm

## When to avoid
- you need full mesh editing or sculpting features beyond remeshing
- you require an actively developed tool with recent updates and support
- you need a library API to embed meshing into your own C++ pipeline

## Facets
- artifact type: application
- maturity: maintenance
- function: graphics, gui, cli
- domain: graphics, computer-vision, developer-tools
- platform: windows, cpp, cross-platform
- tags: mesh-generation, remeshing, retopology, 3d-graphics, geometry-processing, field-aligned-meshes, academia, game-development, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- wjakob/instant-meshes (main) score 32

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:39.612082+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T17:47:21.231736+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/wjakob/instant-meshes (fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:39.612082+00:00, sha f191e9d38c34)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.