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From: nad@cl.cam.ac.uk (Neil Dodgson)
Newsgroups: comp.graphics
Subject: Re: Hexagonal Pixels
Summary: Hexagonal vs Rectangular Grids
Message-ID: <893@scaup.cl.cam.ac.uk>
Date: 19 Sep 89 09:34:56 GMT
References: <2477@canisius.UUCP> <17400010@hpfcdj.HP.COM> <307@unizh.UUCP> <5351@portia.Stanford.EDU>
Sender: news@cl.cam.ac.uk
Reply-To: nad@cl.cam.ac.uk (Neil Dodgson)
Organization: U of Cambridge Comp Lab, UK
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In article <5351@portia.Stanford.EDU> rick@hanauma.UUCP (Richard Ottolini) writes:
>Hexagonal grids are important for differential equation and cellula automata
>grids because they are more isotropic than rectangular grids (less funny
>stuff at 45-degree angles). [...]

Wouldn't a hexagonal grid still give you "funny stuff" at 30-degree angles?

On the other hand 30 < 45, so overall the odd effects should be much reduced
using hexagonal rather than rectangular.  Also, a hexagonal grid is the best
that you can get (if you want all the pixels to be the same shape and tile
the plane) because of the crystallographic restriction.

Neil
====



Disclaimer: these are my opinions and do not neccesarily reflect the opinions
 of Cambridge University, or of my College, or of any of the other 30 colleges.
Datclaimer: on the other hand trying to get all 32 organisations of the U of C
 to agree on ANYTHING would be a major feat in itself - bureaucrazy rules, U.K.