I’m trying to do a script that automatically gives a rough mesh from a mesh.
The purpose is to select several vertices on a mesh and create a mesh (or transform the initial mesh) from those without changing their coordinates (!important!).
I already tried “PointCloudSkinner” addon but it doesn’t give a good result with the mesh I’m working on.
If you don’t want to get into complex coding you might use -as codemanx suggests- the dissolve modifier but if you are not satisfied with the results check MeshLab as well, because it’s extremely specialized in such geometry operations.
I was referring to the Limited Dissolve operator, found in the X menu in edit-mode of a mesh. But of course there is also the Decimate modifier, Remove Doubles operator and maybe a few other things that can be somehow used to create a coarse mesh.
Oh, but you (to a certain extent) can! If you use Decimate in Collapse mode, you can use a vertex group to control which vertices are to be respected, and which one are to go. It isn’t perfect and, if a vertex really needs to go, it will go, but you at least have some control.