# Drawing quadric surfaces using TiKz

Is there any built-in functionality in TiKz/PGF that allows for drawing quadric surfaces, i.e. surfaces given by the equation

Ax^2 + By^2 + Cz^2 + Dz = E?


I'm aware of the raw gnuplot command enabling the use of virtually every gnuplot command (at least to my knowledge).

I tried using the following command:

\begin{tikzpicture}
\draw[thick] plot[raw gnuplot] function{set urange [0:2*pi]; set vrange [0:pi]; set parametric; set isosample 40; splot cos(u)*sin(v)/3, sin(u)*sin(v), cos(v)};
\end{tikzpicture}


but the result is less than satisfactory.

-
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Thank you for the pointers. –  Marius Jan 25 '11 at 11:44

You might be interessted in PGFplots (see: pgfplots.sf.net)

  \begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}[
3d box=background,
% pretty printing, but irrelevant:
title={3d box=background},
samples=5,
domain=-4:4,
xtick=-4:4,
ytick=-4:4,
]
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}


In the official documentation of PGFplots, therer's are some options mentioned about parametric ploting:

• /pgfplots/parametric
• /pgfplots/parametric/var 1d
• /pgfplots/parametric/var 2d

With PGFplots you can use GNUplot aswell:

\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}
\addplot3 gnuplot[raw gnuplot] {set parametric;splot[t=0:6*pi] cos(t),sin(t),t/2*pi};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}

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Thank you. Looks very nice indeed. –  Marius Jan 25 '11 at 12:17

with pst-solides3d which allows hidden surfaces. Here is only the code for the first example. Can be run with xelatex if you need a pdf output

\documentclass{minimal}
\usepackage{pst-solides3d,pgfplots}

\begin{document}

\psset{viewpoint=30 90 0 rtp2xyz,lightsrc=viewpoint,Decran=90}
\begin{pspicture}(-3,-3)(3,3)
\defFunction[algebraic]{Func}(u,v){cos(u)*sin(v)/3}{sin(u)*sin(v)}{cos(v)}
\psSolid[object=surfaceparametree,
base=0 pi dup add 0 pi,
function=Func,linewidth=0.5\pslinewidth,ngrid=25]
\end{pspicture}

\end{document}


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Thanks. I'll check it out. –  Marius Jan 25 '11 at 12:55