How to create a 3D animation

Question

I want to make 3D animation with matplotlib, but I don't know how to. Here is my non-working code.

from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
from mpl_toolkits.mplot3d import Axes3D
from matplotlib import animation
from math import *

fig = plt.figure()
ax = fig.add_subplot(111) #, projection='3d'

#setting
ax.set_xlim(-5,5)
ax.set_ylim(-5,5)
#ax.set_zlim(-5,5)
ax.set_xlabel('x')
ax.set_ylabel('y')
#ax.set_zlabel('z')
ax.grid()

f1, = ax.plot([], [], "r-", lw=1) #plot1

def gen():
    for phi in np.linspace(0,2*pi,100):
        yield np.cos(phi), np.sin(phi), phi

def update(data):
    p1, q1, psi = data
    f1.set_data(p1,q1)
    #f1.set_3d_properties(psi)

ani = animation.FuncAnimation(fig, update, gen, blit=False, interval=100, repeat=True)
#ani.save('matplot003.gif', writer='imagemagick')
plt.show()

Chally

Answer 1

I used this example http://matplotlib.org/1.4.1/examples/animation/simple_3danim.html and modified your code:

from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
from mpl_toolkits.mplot3d import Axes3D
from matplotlib import animation

fig = plt.figure()
ax = fig.add_subplot(projection='3d')

def gen(n):
    phi = 0
    while phi < 2*np.pi:
        yield np.array([np.cos(phi), np.sin(phi), phi])
        phi += 2*np.pi/n

def update(num, data, line):
    line.set_data(data[:2, :num])
    line.set_3d_properties(data[2, :num])

N = 100
data = np.array(list(gen(N))).T
line, = ax.plot(data[0, 0:1], data[1, 0:1], data[2, 0:1])

# Setting the axes properties
ax.set_xlim3d([-1.0, 1.0])
ax.set_xlabel('X')

ax.set_ylim3d([-1.0, 1.0])
ax.set_ylabel('Y')

ax.set_zlim3d([0.0, 10.0])
ax.set_zlabel('Z')

ani = animation.FuncAnimation(fig, update, N, fargs=(data, line), interval=10000/N, blit=False)
#ani.save('matplot003.gif', writer='imagemagick')
plt.show()

Piotrowski

Answer 2

Here is the following code for a sphere moving to the right and off the screen.

You will have to run this code in a folder for tidiness, as it generates 26 .png images (and a .gif image):

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from mpl_toolkits.mplot3d import axes3d
from numpy import sin, cos, pi, outer, ones, size, linspace

# Define x, y, z lists for sphere
a = linspace(0, 2 * pi)
b = linspace(0, pi)
x = 10 * outer(cos(a), sin(b))
y = 10 * outer(sin(a), sin(b))
z = 10 * outer(ones(size(a)), cos(b))

# The amount of frames in the animation
frames = 26

# Generate each frame
for n in range(frames):
    fig = plt.figure(figsize=(10, 10))
    ax = fig.add_subplot(111, projection='3d')
    ax.plot_surface(x, y, z, color=('b'))
    ax.set_xticks([])
    ax.set_yticks([])
    ax.set_zticks([])
    ax.set_xlim(-8,8)
    ax.set_xlim(-8,8)
    ax.set_xlim(-8,8)
    plt.savefig(f"{n}.png")
    plt.close()
    
    # Add 1 to the x so the sphere moves right by 1
    x += 1

# Use pillow to save all frames as an animation in a gif file
from PIL import Image

images = [Image.open(f"{n}.png") for n in range(frames)]

images[0].save('ball.gif', save_all=True, append_images=images[1:], duration=100, loop=0)

Output:

Quentinquercetin