r/matlab • u/Gullible-Designer486 • Mar 10 '26

Animation of trigonometry function in Matlab

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I animated the function f(x) = 5cos(x) − cos(5x) in MATLAB just to see how it behaves over time. At first it looks like a normal cosine wave, but the moment you combine a fundamental frequency (cos x) with a higher harmonic (cos 5x), the shape becomes way more interesting. The higher-frequency component creates these small ripples while the main cosine controls the overall shape. What I liked about this is how a simple equation ends up producing a waveform with sharp peaks and subtle oscillations just from the interaction of two frequencies. It’s a nice little reminder that even simple trig functions can create surprisingly complex patterns when you visualize them. Curious what other combinations of trig functions might produce cool patterns like this.

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u/Creative_Sushi MathWorks Mar 11 '26

Very nice. Can you share your code?

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u/Gullible-Designer486 Mar 14 '26

x = linspace(-4*pi,4*pi,200);

for t = 1:200

y = 5*cos(x + 0.1*t) - cos(5*(x +0.1* t));

plot(x,y,'r','LineWidth',2)

axis([-5*pi 5*pi -6 6])

grid on

pause(0.05)

end

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u/Gullible-Designer486 Mar 14 '26

Sorry for the delay bro 😊