MATLAB: Animation improvement

3d plotsanimationgraphicsMATLAB

I have written a code to create an animation: satellite movement around the Earth. When I run it, it works fine. However, when it is modified to be part of a code much more complex present in a Matlab GUI, the results produced changes (mainly because of the bigger number of points to plot). I also have noticed that if I use the OpenGL renderer the movement of the satellite is quicker than when the other renderers (Painters and Zbuffer) are used. I do not know if there are further possibilities to achieve an improvement in the rendering of the satellite movement. I think the key is, perhaps, changing the code that creates the actual position of the satellite ( handles.psat ) and its trajectory along the time ( handles.tray )
 handles.tray = zeros(1,Fin);
 handles.psat = line('parent',ah4,'XData',Y(1,1), 'YData',Y(1,2),...
      'ZData',Y(1,3),'Marker','o', 'MarkerSize',10,'MarkerFaceColor','b');
  ...
 while (k<Fin)
              az = az + 0.01745329252;
              set(hgrot,'Matrix',makehgtform('zrotate',az));
              handles.tray(k) = line([Y(k-1,1) Y(k,1)],[Y(k-1,2)   Y(k,2)],...
                  [Y(k-1,3) Y(k,3)],...
          'Color','red','LineWidth',3);
              set(handles.psat,'XData',Y(k,1),'YData',Y(k,2),'ZData',Y(k,3));
              pause(0.02); 
              k = k + 1;
              if (state == 1)
                  state = 0;
                  break;
              end
 end
  ...

Best Answer

It might be faster to code the transform yourself as a matrix multiplication rather than calling makehgtform. The array is fairly simple: http://www.siggraph.org/education/materials/HyperGraph/modeling/mod_tran/3drota.htm
           ( cos q  sin q  0  0)
  Rz (q) = (-sin q  cos q  0  0)
           ( 0        0    1  0)
           ( 0        0    0  1)
Only two trig calls needed.
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