Curve and surface construction using variable degree polynomial splines

The aim of this paper is to describe applications of variable degree polynomials in the area of curve and surface construction. These polynomials have the same simple structure and the same properties as cubics with the advantage of a strong control on their shape, given by two degrees which play the role of design parameters. As a consequence, more flexible C(2) B-spline or NURBS like curves and C2 tensor-product or Boolean sum surfaces can br obtained with the same geometric construction and the same computational cost of their cubic counterparts. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.