I am using GNUplot to plot large volumes of data that I want to visualize in 3D - e.g., using the pm3d option. This is very slow rendering in software - is there free software that will do this using OpenGL or something?
A:
ROOT will do this.
This beast is one of the major analysis and visualization tools used in the nuclear and particle physics communities these days. It can move a lot of data fast, and has fairly sophisticated set of visualization tools, and supports OpenGL. You can do the work in compiled c++ code, in the cint interpreter, or using the python bindings.
The big downside is that you may have to read a lot of documentation before you're ready to begin.
dmckee
2009-05-04 03:47:28
There is a reason that ROOT is not really used outside of the nuclear I can only imagine it's even worse in OS X which has all sorts of other quirks (like not having a Fortran compiler - I know ROOT relies heavily on Fortran).
Matt Ball
2009-07-29 15:54:42
ROOT *does not* rely on fortran. You may be thinking of CERNLIB. Installation by hand is a bear, but totally unnecessary in most cases: fink has a ROOT package. I'd have recommended trying lighter weight suggestions first, only there don't seem to be any...
dmckee
2009-07-29 16:11:49
A:
Maybe you could use gnuplot and write the plot to SVG file, and then use some separate accelerated SVG viewer for that file?
oliver
2010-08-17 11:37:05