A method and apparatus are provided for transforming an irregular, unorganized cloud of data points (100) into a volumetric data or "voxel" set (120). Point cloud (100) is represented in a 3D cartesian coordinate system having an x-axis, a y-axis and a z-axis. Voxel set (120) is represented in an alternate 3D cartesian coordinate system having an x'-axis, a y'-axis, and a z'-axis. Each point P(x, y, z) in the point cloud (100) and its associated set of attributes, such as intensity or color, normals, density and/or layer data, are mapped to a voxel V(x', y', z') in the voxel set (120). Given that the point cloud has a high magnitude of points, multiple points from the point cloud may be mapped to a single voxel. When two or more points are mapped to the same voxel, the disparate attribute sets of the mapped points are combined so that each voxel in the voxel set is associated with only one set of attributes.