# Is it possible to animate a bone or a skeleton fetched from Wolfram AnatomyData?

We can get a 3D bone with a simple command like this: (ctrl+)Thigh ["Graphics3D"]

or like this (ctrl+)bone ["Graphics3D"]

Can we animate these objects ? For example, make the thigh turn a circle, or even make the skeleton do a squat exercise ?

Thank you very much.

• I think (as of now) the rotations need to be created manually. Here's an example similar to what you're asking. reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/AnatomyPlot3D.html#549131188 Sep 24 '16 at 1:28
• With respect to animating a skeleton, this might be a useful starting point. Oct 2 '16 at 7:44
• Quite useful, Thank you very much !!! @J. M. Oct 6 '16 at 7:23

{femur, skeleton} = Interpreter[
"ComputedAnatomicalStructure"][#][
"Graphics3D"] & /@ {"left femur", "skeleton"};


This is quite slow to initialize and for any change to ViewPoint for skeleton

Manipulate[
Show[bone, ViewPoint -> vp],
{{bone, femur}, {femur, skeleton}},
{{vp, Front, "View Point"},
{Above, Below, Front, Back, Left, Right,
{Above, Front}, {Above, Back},
{Below, Front}, {Below, Back},
{Left, Above}, {Right, Above},
{Left, Below}, {Right, Below},
{Left, Front}, {Right, Front},
{Left, Back}, {Right, Back},
{Above, Front, Left}, {Above, Front, Right},
{Below, Front, Left}, {Below, Front, Right},
{Above, Back, Left}, {Above, Back, Right},
{Below, Back, Left}, {Below, Back, Right}}},
SynchronousUpdating -> False]


Alternatively, you can set the ViewPoint to {x,y,z} and manipulate these variables

I though I read something about you could not rotate them, but…

As far as manual animation, in V11 I was able to draw a bone with:

AnatomyPlot3D[Entity["AnatomicalStructure", "LeftFemur"]]


and I could animate it manually.

Also, looking at the InputForm[] of the result, shows that it is drawn with a GraphicsComplex[] and there is a ViewPoint-> option, so you should be able to animate it programmatically.

• Your code AnatomyPlot3D... didn't work on v11. I got these messages EntityValue::nodat: Unable to download data. Some or all results may be missing. AnatomyPlot3D::missmod: Unable to obtain a 3D model for Entity[AnatomicalStructure,LeftFemur]. Sep 27 '16 at 17:28
• Sorry Alan...that worked on my V11.0 Mac ElCap...I have seen a bunch of EntityValue[] errors that are basically DB timeouts...sometimes re-running it will succeed...I assume these are infrastructure configuration issues in the back-end (that WRI support is working on) Sep 28 '16 at 20:30