`sphere`

Generates the coordinates of a unit sphere, or draws it.

Syntax

sphere

Draws a unit sphere with 20 panels per direction.

sphere(n)

Draws a sphere with n panels per direction.

[X, Y, Z] = sphere(n)

Returns the coordinate matrices without drawing.

Description

The points are spaced evenly in longitude and latitude, so the output can be passed to surf or mesh. Scale and shift the matrices to get another radius or center, for instance surf(2*X + 1, 2*Y, 2*Z).

Input arguments

n: Number of panels in each direction. The default is 20.

Output arguments

X, Y, Z: Matrices of size (n+1)-by-(n+1) with the points of the sphere, centered at the origin with radius 1.

Example

Coordinates of a sphere

[X, Y, Z] = sphere(10);
disp(size(X))
disp(max(Z(:)))
disp(min(Z(:)))

Output

    11    11
     1
    -1

sphere