I am a TeX/LaTeX noob, but I am learning rapidly. I am about to attempt to draw the following figure using LaTeX/TeX/TikZ I already have a, (I think) good working knowledge of how to draw circles, braces, lines, segments, and nodes, etc.
The last time I drew one though, I noticed that I spent a lot of time fine tuning parameters, making sure that lines intersected circles at the proper points, making sure lines were parallel, etc.
I need to draw the following figure, so I wanted first inquire if there is a fast/easy way, or anything I should keep in mind, when creating parallel lines (the red ones), as per the following figure:
The main time sinks I foresee are going to be the following:
Making sure the length of the purple lines are exactly correct, so as not to overshoot the red ones.
Making sure the red lines are all parallel to each other.
Making sure than I can draw nodes/dots where lines intersect each other and/or the circle.
Is there any particular way(s) that is recommended to make sure that the above points do not waste too much time? I would appreciate any advice/examples.
Thanks!
P.S. I am making good use of TikZ as well.
EDIT:
I am including a minimal example of my 'skill' set. As you can see, I painstakingly usually just have to fine tune co-ordinates, for where things intersect, etc. I also do not know how to not-waste-time if I wanted to make parallel lines, as shown in the red lines above. Here is my example code:
\documentclass[journal]{IEEEtran}
\usepackage{graphicx}
\usepackage{float}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{amsfonts}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{matrix}
\usetikzlibrary{decorations.pathreplacing}
\usepackage{xspace}
\usepackage{float}
\usepackage{capt-of}
\usepackage{cases}
\begin{document}
\newcommand{\var}{1.5}
\begin{tikzpicture}
%\begin{tikzpicture}
\draw [help lines] (-4,-4) grid (4,4);
% Draw the axes
\draw [->,black, ] (-4,0) -- (4,0) ;
\draw [->,black] (0,-4) -- (0,4) ;
% Draw the circle
\path [draw, ultra thick, black] (0,0) circle (3);
%Radial Lines
\draw[black](0:0)--(45:3);
\draw[black](0:0)--(135:3);
\draw[black](0:0)--(225:3);
\draw[black](0:0)--(315:3);
%Wavefront normal
\draw[blue](0:0)--(60:3);
\draw[blue](0:0)--(240:3);
\draw[blue](0,1) arc (90:60:1);
\draw[blue] (0,0.95)arc(90:60:0.95);
\node[] at (75:1.2) {$\alpha$};
\draw[blue] (0.7,1.2)arc(90:30:0.37);
%\node[] at (50:2) {$\frac{pi}{4}-\alpha$};
\draw[-latex](1.5,3)node[right]{$\frac{\pi}{4}-\alpha$}
to[out=180,in=90] (50:1.5);
%Points
\path[fill, black](45:3) circle(0.1);
\node[] at (45:3.3){1};
\path[fill, black](135:3) circle(0.1);
\node[] at (133:3.3){4};
\path[fill,black](225:3) circle(0.1);
\node[] at (225:3.3){3};
\path[fill, black](315:3) circle(0.1);
\node[] at (313:3.3){2};
%Wavefronts
\draw[blue, ultra thick](-.5,3.6347)--(3.5,1.3252);
\draw[blue, ultra thick](-2.5,2.34)--(3.5,-1.1242);
\draw[blue, ultra thick](-3.2,0.9509)--(2.8,-2.5132);
\draw[blue, ultra thick](-3.2,-1.4985)--(0.2,-3.4615);
%Right angle signs
\draw[red](60:2.8)--(62:2.8)--(62:2.9);
\draw[red](60:.68)--(68:.69)--(67:.79);
% Done
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}
The above code is now giving me this:
pstricks
andtikz
. They both have an initially steep learning curve. I don't do much work intikz
but I'd be more than happy to make suggestions of what to write forpstricks
. – A.Ellett May 16 '13 at 21:18