trisurf

R2026b

Triangular surface plot

Syntax

trisurf(T,x,y,z)

trisurf(TO)

trisurf(___,c)

trisurf(___,Name=Value)

h = trisurf(___)

Description

trisurf(T,x,y,z) plots the 3-D triangular surface defined by the points in x, y, and z, and a triangle connectivity matrix T.

trisurf(TO) plots the surface defined by a 3-D triangulation or delaunayTriangulation object.

trisurf(___,c) also specifies the surface color for either of the previous syntaxes.

trisurf(___,Name=Value) specifies one or more properties of the surface plot using name-value arguments. For example, FaceColor="y" sets the face color to yellow.

h = trisurf(___) returns a patch object used to create the surface plot. Use h to query and modify properties of the plot. For more information, see Patch Properties.

Examples

3-D Surface Plot

Create a set of 3-D points and compute the Delaunay triangulation using the delaunay function. Plot the surface defined by the triangulation.

[x,y] = meshgrid(1:15,1:15);
z = peaks(15);
T = delaunay(x,y);
trisurf(T,x,y,z)

Alternatively, you can create and plot a triangulation object.

TO = triangulation(T,x(:),y(:),z(:));
trisurf(TO)

Input Arguments

T — Triangle connectivity

matrix

Triangle connectivity, specified as a 3-column matrix where each row contains the point vertices defining a triangle face.

x — x-coordinates

vector | matrix

x-coordinates, specified as a vector or matrix.

y — y-coordinates

vector | matrix

y-coordinates, specified as a vector or matrix.

z — z-coordinates

vector | matrix

z-coordinates, specified as a vector or matrix.

c — Face color

matrix

Face color, specified as a matrix of colormap indices the same size as z. For more information, see How Surface Plot Data Relates to a Colormap. For additional control over the surface coloring, use the 'EdgeColor' and 'FaceColor' name-value pairs.

TO — Triangulation object

triangulation | delaunayTriangulation

Triangulation object, specified as a triangulation or delaunayTriangulation object.

Name-Value Arguments

Specify optional pairs of arguments as Name1=Value1,...,NameN=ValueN, where Name is the argument name and Value is the corresponding value. Name-value arguments must appear after other arguments, but the order of the pairs does not matter.

Example: trisurf(TO,FaceColor="r")

The properties listed here are only a subset. For a complete list, see Patch Properties.

FaceColor — Face color

[0.85 0.85 0.85] (default) | color name | RGB triplet | "none"

Face color, specified as a color name, an RGB triplet, or "none".

An RGB triplet is a three-element row vector whose elements specify the intensities of the red, green, and blue components of the color. The intensities must be in the range [0,1]; for example, [0.4 0.6 0.7]. This table lists the long and short color name options and the equivalent RGB triplet values.

Long Name	Short Name	RGB Triplet
"yellow"	"y"	[1 1 0]
"magenta"	"m"	[1 0 1]
"cyan"	"c"	[0 1 1]
"red"	"r"	[1 0 0]
"green"	"g"	[0 1 0]
"blue"	"b"	[0 0 1]
"white"	"w"	[1 1 1]
"black"	"k"	[0 0 0]

FaceAlpha — Face transparency

1 (default) | scalar in range [0,1]

Face transparency, specified as a scalar in the range [0,1]. A value of 1 is opaque and 0 is completely transparent. Values between 0 and 1 are semitransparent.

EdgeColor — Edge color

[0 0 0] (default) | color name | RGB triplet | "none"

Edge color, specified as a color name, an RGB triplet, or "none". The default color of [0 0 0] corresponds to black boundaries.

An RGB triplet is a three-element row vector whose elements specify the intensities of the red, green, and blue components of the color. The intensities must be in the range [0,1]; for example, [0.4 0.6 0.7]. This table lists the long and short color name options and the equivalent RGB triplet values.

Long Name	Short Name	RGB Triplet
"yellow"	"y"	[1 1 0]
"magenta"	"m"	[1 0 1]
"cyan"	"c"	[0 1 1]
"red"	"r"	[1 0 0]
"green"	"g"	[0 1 0]
"blue"	"b"	[0 0 1]
"white"	"w"	[1 1 1]
"black"	"k"	[0 0 0]

LineWidth — Line width

0.5 (default) | positive numeric value

Line width, specified as a positive numeric value in points.

LineStyle — Line style

"-" (default) | "--" | ":" | "-." | "none"

Line style, specified as one of the options listed in this table.

Line Style	Description	Resulting Line
"-"	Solid line
"--"	Dashed line
":"	Dotted line
"-."	Dash-dotted line
"none"	No line	No line

Extended Capabilities

GPU Arrays

Accelerate code by running on a graphics processing unit (GPU) using Parallel Computing Toolbox™.

The trisurf function supports GPU array input with these usage notes and limitations:

• This function accepts GPU arrays, but does not run on a GPU.

For more information, see Run MATLAB Functions on a GPU (Parallel Computing Toolbox).

Distributed Arrays

Partition large arrays across the combined memory of your cluster using Parallel Computing Toolbox™.

The trisurf function supports distributed arrays with these usage notes and limitations:

• This function operates on distributed arrays, but executes on the client MATLAB^®.

For more information, see Run MATLAB Functions with Distributed Arrays (Parallel Computing Toolbox).

Version History

Introduced before R2006a