d 1 t are used. The interpolated values should correspond to the same sort order provided in the t array. The result may be 1-dimensional if ``t`` is a float. Raises ------ ValueError If ``start`` and ``end`` are antipodes, not on the unit n-sphere, or for a variety of degenerate conditions. See Also -------- scipy.spatial.transform.Slerp : 3-D Slerp that works with quaternions Notes ----- The implementation is based on the mathematical formula provided in [1]_, and the first known presentation of this algorithm, derived from study of 4-D geometry, is credited to Glenn Davis in a footnote of the original quaternion Slerp publication by Ken Shoemake [2]_. .. versionadded:: 1.5.0 References ---------- .. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slerp#Geometric_Slerp .. [2] Ken Shoemake (1985) Animating rotation with quaternion curves. ACM SIGGRAPH Computer Graphics, 19(3): 245-254. Examples -------- Interpolate four linearly-spaced values on the circumference of a circle spanning 90 degrees: >>> import numpy as np >>> from scipy.spatial import geometric_slerp >>> import matplotlib.pyplot as plt >>> fig = plt.figure() >>> ax = fig.add_subplot(111) >>> start = np.array([1, 0]) >>> end = np.array([0, 1]) >>> t_vals = np.linspace(0, 1, 4) >>> result = geometric_slerp(start, ... end, ... t_vals) The interpolated results should be at 30 degree intervals recognizable on the unit circle: >>> ax.scatter(result[...,0], result[...,1], c='k') >>> circle = plt.Circle((0, 0), 1, color='grey') >>> ax.add_artist(circle) >>> ax.set_aspect('equal') >>> plt.show() Attempting to interpolate between antipodes on a circle is ambiguous because there are two possible paths, and on a sphere there are infinite possible paths on the geodesic surface. Nonetheless, one of the ambiguous paths is returned along with a warning: >>> opposite_pole = np.array([-1, 0]) >>> with np.testing.suppress_warnings() as sup: ... sup.filter(UserWarning) ... geometric_slerp(start, ... opposite_pole, ... t_vals) array([[ 1.00000000e+00, 0.00000000e+00], [ 5.00000000e-01, 8.66025404e-01], [-5.00000000e-01, 8.66025404e-01], [-1.00000000e+00, 1.22464680e-16]]) Extend the original example to a sphere and plot interpolation points in 3D: >>> from mpl_toolkits.mplot3d import proj3d >>> fig = plt.figure() >>> ax = fig.add_subplot(111, projection='3d') Plot the unit sphere for reference (optional): >>> u = np.linspace(0, 2 * np.pi, 100) >>> v = np.linspace(0, np.pi, 100) >>> x = np.outer(np.cos(u), np.sin(v)) >>> y = np.outer(np.sin(u), np.sin(v)) >>> z = np.outer(np.ones(np.size(u)), np.cos(v)) >>> ax.plot_surface(x, y, z, color='y', alpha=0.1) Interpolating over a larger number of points may provide the appearance of a smooth curve on the surface of the sphere, which is also useful for discretized integration calculations on a sphere surface: >>> start = np.array([1, 0, 0]) >>> end = np.array([0, 0, 1]) >>> t_vals = np.linspace(0, 1, 200) >>> result = geometric_slerp(start, ... end, ... t_vals) >>> ax.plot(result[...,0], ... result[...,1], ... result[...,2], ... c='k') >>> plt.show() )