Creating a 3d surface plot

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Reed
Reed on 25 Mar 2011
Answered: Shivam Anand on 11 May 2022
I have several x,y coordinates and an associated z-value for each x,y coordinate set. I would like to generate a 3d plot of these points, preferably with a mesh-like surface but am having trouble setting it up. I currently have three Nx1 vectors, one for the x-coordinates, one for the y-coordinates, and one for the z-values. How would I go about setting this plot up? The x,y coordinates are not in a nice rectangular grid, so meshgrid hasn't worked for me so far. Thanks, Reed

Accepted Answer

Matt Tearle
Matt Tearle on 26 Mar 2011
TriScatteredInterp Here's an example (taken from the doc):
% Make some fake vector data
x = rand(100,1)*4-2;
y = rand(100,1)*4-2;
z = x.*exp(-x.^2-y.^2);
% Put data onto a grid
[qx,qy] = meshgrid(linspace(min(x),max(x)),linspace(min(y),max(y)));
F = TriScatteredInterp(x,y,z);
qz = F(qx,qy);
surf(qx,qy,qz)

More Answers (2)

the cyclist
the cyclist on 25 Mar 2011
You will probably be well served by some combination of the following commands:
  • griddata
  • meshgrid
  • plot3
  • triscatteredinterp
  • mesh
  • surf<li>

Shivam Anand
Shivam Anand on 11 May 2022
x=[32 20 67 1 98 34 57 65 24 82 47 55 8 51 13 14 18 30 37 39 10 33 21 26 38 81 83 60 95 22 17 5 72 46 99 52 12 25 96 29 70 85 43 69 19 78 97 31 89 53 2 91 48 71 61 15 36 84 94 50 11 80 6 7 49 74 9 88 40 79 27 68 73 64 63 59 86 23 35 58 45 28 100 42 93 87 16 90 41 66 54 92 77 4 62 76 75 56 3 44];
y=[96 75 24 9 83 49 27 77 3 23 17 31 40 13 7 52 51 21 98 47 64 79 78 91 44 16 15 100 84 99 63 68 70 30 54 76 97 73 33 5 88 8 71 66 62 25 60 42 72 45 18 11 28 59 89 65 10 55 69 81 12 26 20 95 87 41 74 50 93 22 43 90 14 34 82 35 56 38 80 32 1 57 6 36 37 61 29 58 2 48 4 46 67 53 92 86 94 19 39 85];
z=[55 31 11 45 83 36 86 49 15 57 42 46 8 94 88 47 54 81 98 41 32 35 56 85 9 89 37 60 23 62 67 100 78 76 73 80 10 20 68 34 77 93 1 63 53 12 22 99 91 40 84 24 33 3 43 19 92 97 6 82 64 25 26 79 95 4 44 58 5 21 70 29 65 87 96 90 51 14 18 2 72 28 71 39 52 7 27 59 50 61 48 30 66 69 17 13 74 16 75 38];
xlin = linspace(min(x), max(x), 100);
ylin = linspace(min(y), max(y), 100);
[X,Y] = meshgrid(xlin, ylin);
% Z = griddata(x,y,z,X,Y,'natural');
% Z = griddata(x,y,z,X,Y,'cubic');
Z = griddata(x,y,z,X,Y,'v4');
mesh(X,Y,Z)
axis tight; hold on
plot3(x,y,z,'.','MarkerSize',15)

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