Perhaps this is not the right place to ask the following question but I did not find any suitable on the web. So I would be very grateful for sharing your experience.


What is a good program to draw cobordisms or surfaces (oriented) in order to integrate them in a Latex file?


I have the same question for graphs and plane objects. Moreover I don't mind to use several different solutions if this is necessary.



Program for drawing cobordisms
Planar stuff is not too hard. I generally use the LaTeX package tikz, because that way everything is in the LaTeX file.


Three-dimensional pictures are harder. If you know equations for your surfaces then you can plot them using Maple or Mathematica and then export as jpeg say, and then include in your LaTeX file using the graphicx package and the \includegraphics command. However, it is surprisingly hard to find good equations for the kind of two-holed doughnuts or pairs of pants that people typically draw. I have done a few pictures like this using Blender (www.blender.org) but it was hard work and I wasn't totally happy with the result. Of course it is also possible to draw pictures by hand and scan them.


