Application of subdivision surfaces in ship hull form modeling

This article covers the application of generalized B-splines for the representation of hull forms. It is possible to represent hull forms with a single B-spline surface. The main advantage is, however, the ability to use the control mesh for modeling. It is shown that the structure of a control mesh and the principles to define a control mesh are essentially the same as for curve networks which are mostly used to define hull surfaces. In contrast to the common belief in the industry, it is analyzed that the approximation-based definition of a hull surface in terms of a control mesh simplifies modeling and improves the robustness compared to interpolation-based methods such as the commonly found interpolation of curve networks.