Stereolithography (STL)¶
STL was developed by 3D Systems in 1987 as part of their stereolithography 3D printing technology. The format represents 3D surfaces using triangular tessellation only, defining geometry without color or texture. STL is widely used in 3D printing application as well as other use cases due to its simplicity.
🔍 See 3D Data Concepts for details and definitions.
Extensions¶
.stl
Structure¶
instant3Dhub supports the following characteristic STL structural features:
Monolithic Files: STL files are self-contained and store a single 3D object.
File Variants: Available in ASCII and binary formats, with binary being more compact.
Geometry¶
Tesselation¶
As STL wraps 3D data in tesselated form, instant3Dhub supports the following aspects:
Triangle-based rendering for accurate surface visualization.
Normal vector interpretation to ensure correct shading and orientation.
B-Rep¶
Boundary Representations are not supported in STL files.
PMI & Model Views¶
PMI and model views are not supported in STL files.
Metadata¶
Metadata is not supported in STL files.
Miscellaneous¶
STL data cannot transport color or texture information.
STL data does not contain unit information, instant3Dhub scales the geometry per default in units of meters.