[SciPy-User] creating a 3D surface plot from collected data

[Rob Clewley]

Joe,

On Tue, Feb 16, 2010 at 9:23 AM, Joe Kington <jkington at wisc.edu> wrote:
> The interpolation example I posted implicitly assumes that z = f(x,y). In
> other words, that there is only one z value for any given x and y.  If
> you're working with a 3D kidney-shape, this is clearly not the case.
>

I too have some data that has multiple z values in the x,y  domain.
Worse, my data is not remotely arranged in a proper grid as it is
temporal trajectory data from a 3D ODE that winds itself round and
round the surface, like a very carefully wrapped mummy. I.e., it
doesn't wrap back over itself.

I'm not familiar with 3D plotting techniques and trying to set up the
plot of my surface in mayavi or matplotlib is not working along the
lines of standard cookbook examples. I cannot find appropriate
information online on how to plot the surface if I can't run the
interpolator for data that's not a function of (x,y) and my data needs
"alignment".

But maybe I'm looking in the wrong place. Could you provide any pointers please?

-Rob