Imagine taking a thermal image of a consumer appliance / object.  The
resulting image shows the surface temperature variations.

I need to generate a similar representation without using a thermal
imaging camera.

I need a software package or utility that will allow me to (in
decreasing order of preference) generally define an arbitrary shape,
connect simple shapes (spheres, boxes, etc) together or use default
simple shapes.  With the shape established, I would then provide
temperature isotherms to the program / utility.  I imagine a suitable
solution would visualize those isotherms with lines (acceptable) or
blend colors (preferable).

Alternatively, and obviously less preferable, I can work in two
dimensions.  If an add-in or utility is located, I have Microsoft
Office, Visio Professional 2002, AutoDesk AutoSketch 8 and a variety
of image editors.

In either 2D or 3D I would like to have the ability to overlay my
predicted thermal depiction on top of an existing photograph of the
object.  The image would need ‘transparency’ for this to work.  Such a
solution might allow me to import my picture as a background.  Ideally
I could choose between isotherm lines or colors depending on which
looked better.

As I would only use this intermittently, I would prefer a freeware,
shareware or low cost solution.  I would rather stay in 2D with low
cost than work in 3D (perspective) at a higher cost.  Novel use of
some other utility (barometric pressure, land topography / contouring,
etc) is acceptable.  Thanks for taking a swing at this.

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Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 21 Feb 2003 12:04 PST

This sound pretty manageable, but there's one part of your request I'm
not sure I understand.  When you say that you would "then provide
termperature isotherms to the program..." what do you actually mean?

Do you want to be able to draw lines on your image, according to where
you think isotherms would be?  Or are you looking to input some sort
of data on temperature and position, and have the software translate
this to an image?  Or is it something else you're after?

Let us know, and there's a good chance that I or another researcher
can help you out.

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Clarification of Question by iota-ga on 21 Feb 2003 13:16 PST

"With the shape established, I would then provide temperature
isotherms to the program / utility."

It is as you have assumed.  With the shape in place, the program /
utility must know the values.  I would need to supply the values so
the program / utility can form the isotherms.

More clarification, since I have a CAD package (of sorts) I can draw
isotherms; but, I don't want to.  I want to provide or link to a table
whereby I can modify the values and see the isotherm visualization
change (dragging a line or hovering the mouse while +/- would be nice
:).

Obviously, better responses make the task more automated and the
results more professionally polished.  Otherwise, I'd just use
AutoSketch or Excel (draw).

Thanks for investigating.

Iota,
Your post seems to have been a while ago. I might have a clue on how
to solve your problem, but I don't understand much about isometric
curves. What do the values that you provide to the diagram look like?
Do you expect each shape to color independently, through a gradient or
something like that?