Combining Regions

There are a few ways to combine any two Region objects into a compound region, i.e., a CompoundPixelRegion or CompoundSkyRegion object.

Let’s start by defining two sky regions:

>>> from astropy.coordinates import Angle, SkyCoord
>>> from regions import CircleSkyRegion

>>> circle1 = CircleSkyRegion(
...    center=SkyCoord(1, 2, unit='deg', frame='galactic'),
...    radius=Angle('5 deg'))
>>> circle2 = CircleSkyRegion(
...    center=SkyCoord(-4, 3, unit='deg', frame='galactic'),
...    radius=Angle('3 deg'))

Intersection (AND)

To create an intersection compound region, use either the & operator or the intersection() method:

>>> comp_region = circle1 & circle2
>>> print(comp_region)
Region: CompoundSkyRegion
region1: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (1., 2.)>
radius: 5.0 deg
region2: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (356., 3.)>
radius: 3.0 deg
operator: <built-in function and_>

>>> comp_region = circle1.intersection(circle2)
>>> print(comp_region)
Region: CompoundSkyRegion
region1: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (1., 2.)>
radius: 5.0 deg
region2: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (356., 3.)>
radius: 3.0 deg
operator: <built-in function and_>

Union (OR)

To create a union compound region, use either the | operator or the union() method:

>>> comp_region = circle1 | circle2
>>> print(comp_region)
Region: CompoundSkyRegion
region1: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (1., 2.)>
radius: 5.0 deg
region2: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (356., 3.)>
radius: 3.0 deg
operator: <built-in function or_>

>>> comp_region = circle1.union(circle2)
>>> print(comp_region)
Region: CompoundSkyRegion
region1: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (1., 2.)>
radius: 5.0 deg
region2: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (356., 3.)>
radius: 3.0 deg
operator: <built-in function or_>

Symmetric Difference (XOR)

To create a symmetric difference compound region, use either the ^ operator or the symmetric_difference() method:

>>> comp_region = circle1 ^ circle2
>>> print(comp_region)
Region: CompoundSkyRegion
region1: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (1., 2.)>
radius: 5.0 deg
region2: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (356., 3.)>
radius: 3.0 deg
operator: <built-in function xor>

>>> comp_region = circle1.symmetric_difference(circle2)
>>> print(comp_region)
Region: CompoundSkyRegion
region1: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (1., 2.)>
radius: 5.0 deg
region2: Region: CircleSkyRegion
center: <SkyCoord (Galactic): (l, b) in deg
    (356., 3.)>
radius: 3.0 deg
operator: <built-in function xor>

Example Illustrating Compound Regions

(Source code, png, hires.png, pdf, svg)