[GIF] Left or Right? (Rotating Roman surface)

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1

rotating3L2r.gif

Left or Right?

A slightly unusual view of the Roman surface.

Source code:

DynamicModule[{cols},
 cols = RGBColor /@ {"#FFF4E1", "#E67A7A"};
 Manipulate[
  ParametricPlot3D[
   Evaluate@
    Table[{Cos[?] Sin[?] Sin[?], Cos[?] Sin[?] Cos[?], Cos[?]^2 Cos[?] Sin[?]}, 
      {?, 0, 2 ?, ?/50}], {?, 0, 2 ?}, PlotRange -> 1/2, 
   ViewPoint -> 5 {Cos[t], Sin[t], 0}, Boxed -> False, Axes -> False, 
   ImageSize -> 540, SphericalRegion -> True, Background -> cols[[2]],
    PlotStyle -> Directive[Thickness[.004], cols[[1]]]], {t, 0, ?}]
 ]
5 Likes
2

2015-11-02_10-07-11.png

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3

My take:

With[{cols = RGBColor /@ {"#FFF4E1", "#E67A7A"}},
     Manipulate[ParametricPlot3D[{Cos[?] Sin[?] Sin[?], Cos[?] Sin[?] Cos[?], Cos[?]^2 Cos[?] Sin[?]},
                                 {?, 0, 2 ?}, {?, 0, 2 ?}, Axes -> False, Background -> cols[[2]], Boxed -> False,
                                 ImageSize -> 540, Mesh -> 99, MeshFunctions -> {#4 &},
                                 MeshStyle -> Directive[Thickness[.004], cols[[1]]], PlotRange -> 1/2,
                                 PlotStyle -> None, SphericalRegion -> True, ViewPoint -> 5 {Cos[t], Sin[t], 0}],
                 {t, 0, ?}]]

Increase PlotPoints as needed.

4

Nice. I think I switched from meshes to individually-plotted curves because the mesh was not playing very nicely with the surface I originally had in this. Of course, when I got rid of the surface altogether, I should have gone back to the mesh, since it’s faster and conceptually simpler.

Incidentally, what’s the reason for using With rather than DynamicModule?

5

Since you aren’t dynamically changing cols in your Manipulate[] (which I’d say is really the only reason to use DynamicModule[]), simply injecting them with With[] suffices.