vol3d v2

3-d volume (voxel) rendering

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Editor's Note: This file was selected as MATLAB Central Pick of the Week

An update to Joe Conti's popular vol3d function, allowing voxel colors and alpha values to be defined explicitly. Functionality is increased, but the function is entirely backwards compatible.
In cases where voxels can be any RGB color, use:
vol3d('CData', cdata);
where cdata is an MxNxPx3 array, with RGB color along the 4th dimension. In cases where color and alpha values are highly independent, specify an MxNxP alphamatte as follows:
vol3d('CData', cdata, 'Alpha', alpha);
This function amends the original (as little as possible) with the full permission of Joe Conti. The original function, which came with some additional tools for editing colormaps and alphamaps, is sadly no longer available.

The way this rendering approach works is to render the six sides of each voxel as a translucent plane.

Cite As

Oliver Woodford (2026). vol3d v2 (https://uk.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/22940-vol3d-v2), MATLAB Central File Exchange. Retrieved .

Acknowledgements

Inspired: Volumetric 3, VOXview, pcolor3, TACTICS Toolbox

General Information

MATLAB Release Compatibility

  • Compatible with any release

Platform Compatibility

  • Windows
  • macOS
  • Linux
Version Published Release Notes Action
1.2.2.0

Add comment on rendering technique.

1.2.1.0

Update description to acknowledge the disappearance of the original vol3d.

1.2.0.0

Avoid destroying other vol3d objects when rerendering. Added a demo.

1.0.0.0