Data formats
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## Data formats

MayaVi is a data visualizer and one first needs to have data to visualize anything. MayaVi supports the following data formats:

VTK data format

  MayaVi supports any VTK dataset using the VTK data format. This includes rectilinear, structured and unstructured grid data and also polygonal data. Please refer the linked document for details on the VTK data format. The new VTK XML data format is also supported by MayaVi.

PLOT3D data

  MayaVi supports PLOT3D file format with binary structured grid data. The other PLOT3D datasets will not work due to limitations in VTK's vtkPLOT3DReader. Simple support for multi-block data is also incorporated.

EnSight data

  MayaVi supports EnSight data. EnSight6 and EnSightGold formats are supported. Only single parts are supported at this time.

In addition to this MayaVi allows one to import VRML2 files and 3D Studio files. Texturing is not yet supported due to limitations in VTK's vtkVRMLImporter.

Those interested in converting data arrays under Python into VTK files should look at Pearu Peterson's pyVTK Python module.

MayaVi ships with a simple example of a heart CT scan data in the VTK data format (this should be in the `examples/` directory). The dataset used is a structured points dataset with a scalar field. This can be used as a simple reference. More VTK, PLOT3D and EnSight data samples should be available from the VTK download page.

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