# Properly viewing triclinic boxes that have STRUCTURED\_POINTS dataset
**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Tags:** vtk
**Created:** [February 6, 2026, 5:40pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434 "2026-02-06T17:40:04Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@akball](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/akball)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2026, 5:40pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/1 "2026-02-06T17:40:04Z")
Hi everyone, I am new to ParaView, so please feel free to refer to any related posts or responses. I am having trouble visualizing VTK files containing volumetric data for triclinic cells. During visualization, the triclinic box is converted to an orthorhombic box. I understand that this is possible because my dataset is of type STRUCTURED\_POINTS, and that the issue can be resolved by converting the grid to an unstructured grid in ParaView. However, I am unable to find any resources that actually work! The header section of my VTK file is as follows:
vtk DataFile Version 1.0
CELL\_PARAMETERS 35.836600 35.836600 35.836600 60.000000 60.000000 60.000000
ASCII
DATASET STRUCTURED\_POINTS
DIMENSIONS 150 150 150
ORIGIN 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000
SPACING 0.238911 0.238911 0.238911
POINT\_DATA 3375000
SCALARS scalars unsigned\_short
LOOKUP\_TABLE default
65535
4503
It would be extremely helpful to have someone help with this! Thanks!
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2026, 9:41am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/2 "2026-02-09T09:41:31Z")
Please share a proper .vtk file, or at least use ``` to share the content.
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### Author:  [@akball](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/akball)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2026, 5:26pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/3 "2026-02-09T17:26:29Z")
Hi Mathieu, thank you so much for your help! Due to size limits, I am attaching a link to the .vtk file here: [https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/9tlaujz2ycxrjuz5his6w/2019-Ni-fcu-3-ASR-1\_pristine\_1\_pacmanSurface.vtk?rlkey=wsp4vn8d5x302izpi387qt1h8&st=37i3nbqq&dl=0](https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/9tlaujz2ycxrjuz5his6w/2019-Ni-fcu-3-ASR-1_pristine_1_pacmanSurface.vtk?rlkey=wsp4vn8d5x302izpi387qt1h8&st=37i3nbqq&dl=0)
Please let me know if you have any questions!
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2026, 9:00am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/4 "2026-02-10T09:00:12Z")
This opens fine as an image data:
You can convert to an Unstructured Grid by adding a “AppendDataSet” filter, but it looks exactly the same, so I’m not sure what you are trying to achieve here.
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### Author:  [@akball](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/akball)
#### Post date: [February 12, 2026, 3:42pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/5 "2026-02-12T15:42:24Z")
Hi Mathieu, thank you so much for your response! Yes, the image looks fine. However, if we look more closely, the box seems orthorombic, even though the original box is triclinic. We can see that from the very first line in the VTK file, where the cell parameters are specified as follows:
vtk DataFile Version 1.0
CELL\_PARAMETERS 35.836600 35.836600 35.836600 60.000000 60.000000 60.000000
My question was how to correctly visualize the box in triclinic form, since ParaView automatically converts it to orthorhombic form. Please let me know if you need any more information! Thanks!
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [February 12, 2026, 3:50pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/6 "2026-02-12T15:50:38Z")
So I’ve been reading this to try to understand what you mean: [https://www2.tulane.edu/~sanelson/eens211/32crystalclass.htm](https://www2.tulane.edu/~sanelson/eens211/32crystalclass.htm)
Can you explain with your own words the problem you see ? I dont get it.
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### Author:  [@akball](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/akball)
#### Post date: [February 12, 2026, 4:05pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/7 "2026-02-12T16:05:04Z")
Thanks for your help! The original box looks like the following shape(rombohedral), where all the sides have equal lengths (35.8366 Å) and with 60^{\circ} angle between each of the two sides.
However, in the ParaView visualization, the box is converted to a cubic shape. My questions was how to fix that.
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [February 12, 2026, 4:19pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/properly-viewing-triclinic-boxes-that-have-structured-points-dataset/17434/8 "2026-02-12T16:19:05Z")
Is this about the camera parallel projection ? like this?
I’m sorry I’m not following, the angles you point out of 90 degrees, not 60 degreeses