Point cloud
A 3D scene stored as a large set of individual points in space, each with a position and usually a colour.
A point cloud is the simplest way to describe a three dimensional thing to a computer: a long list of coordinates, often millions of them, each marking a spot where something was measured. Laser scanners, depth cameras, and now AI reconstruction models all produce them. Zoom out and it looks like a photograph; zoom in and you see the gaps between the dots.
Point clouds are the raw material rather than the finished product. Architecture, surveying, and robotics work with them directly, while games and film usually convert them into surfaces first. Their advantage is honesty: a point cloud records what was actually observed, with holes where nothing was.