3D point cloud simplification is an important pretreatment in surface reconstruction for sparing computer resources and improving reconstruction speed. However, existing methods often sacrifice the simplification precision to improve the simplification speed, or sacrifice the speed to improve precision. A proper balance between the simplification speed and the simplification accuracy is still a challenge. In this paper, we propose a new simplification method based on the importance of point. Named as detail feature points simplified algorithm (DFPSA), this algorithm has distinct processes to achieve improvements in three aspects. First, a rule of k neighborhood search is set to ensure the points found are the closest to the sample point. In this way, the accuracy of calculated normal vector of the point cloud is significantly improved, and the search speed is largely increased. Second, a formula that considers multiple characteristics for measuring the importance of point is proposed. Thereupon, the main detail features of the point cloud are preserved. Finally, an octree structure is employed to simplify the remaining points, through which holes in reconstructing point cloud are obviously reduced. The DFPSA is applied to four different data sets, and the corresponding results are compared with those of other five algorithms. The experimental results demonstrate that the DFPSA brings better simplification effects than existing counterparts, and the DFPSA not only can simplify point cloud but also has good effect in simplifying subject's narrow contours.INDEX TERMS 3D geometric point cloud simplification, detail feature point, k neighborhood search rule, the importance of point.

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