PlyFile

This is a Python module, which provides a simple facility for reading and writing ASCII and binary PLY files. (via documentation )

It begins with a header as seen here:

PlyFile	Meaning
ply	identifies the file as a plyfile
format ascii 1.0 format binary little endian 1.0 format binary big endian 1.0	chooses the encoding of the file
comment	allows for commenting on the plyfile
element vertex	describes vertices as a tupel of coordinates
property varibale x, y, z	coordinate tupel for the vertex
element face	describes object faces as a tupel
end_head	ends the header of the plyfile

This is better explained with an example. This is a tetrahedron:

tetrahedron plyFile	Meaning
ply	identifies the file as a plyfile
format ascii 1.0	chooses the encoding of the file
element vertex 4	tetrahedron has 4 vertices
property float x property float y property float z	coordinates
property list uchar int vertex_indices	definition of the faces
property uchar red property uchar green property uchar blue	introducing color
end_head	ends the header of the plyfile

With the following body-content that comes after the header

This is the same simple tetrahedron designed on GeoGebra

This can either be the body in the plyFile or, as a comparison, the same tetrahedron defined in Python.

Both of these generate the same tetrahedron as seen previously.