Quote - ...What I do is use the closest vertices weights to average the normal, rather than just adding up all the normals and then dividing by the number of normals.  This seems to give more precision (less influence by distant vertices)...

Ahh - gotcha.  I didn't really know what you were doing :).  So you're creating a weighted-average Normal.. hmm... it sounds interesting/promising, but I'd need to see your code, I think.  One potential difference (aside from the obvious) is that I was also including the target vertex's Normal in the averaging, to help keep it from casting off in some too-diverse angle.

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