Rotation to form a pyramid

Hi,

I have an idea and want to implement it in WebGL. Normally, we have to create many vertex to form a pyramid (at least four triangle and three vertex for each triangle).

However, I want to use only one triangle to form a pyramid. The method is that I rotate the screen 90 degree after drawing one triangle. Then, I can rotate it again and drawing the second triangle and so on. Therefore, if I change the size of the triangle, I only change one time without extra effort.

But, I fail to implement it with the following coding:
for (var j = 0; j < n; j++) {
        mvPushMatrix();
        mvRotate(1, [0, 1, 0]);
        setMatrixUniforms();
        gl.drawElements(gl.TRIANGLES, pyramidVertexIndexBuffer.numItems, gl.UNSIGNED_SHORT, 0);
        mvPopMatrix();
    }
It only show me one triangle. Is there any mistakes I made?

Yes, you use the same rotation for every triangle.
Rotation angle should depend on j value.
Try something like:


var deltaAngle = Math.PI * 2 / n;
for (var j = 0; j < n; j++) {
        mvPushMatrix();
        mvRotate(j * deltaAngle, [0, 1, 0]);
        setMatrixUniforms();
        gl.drawElements(gl.TRIANGLES, pyramidVertexIndexBuffer.numItems, gl.UNSIGNED_SHORT, 0);
        mvPopMatrix();
    }

(not tested!)

How do you figure out the volume of a segmented pyramid? Let’s say there’s a pyramid, and you’re given the base length (16) and height (10). If we were to cut off the top 4 inches of the pyramid, how can you calculate the volume of just that segment of the pyramid?