Mathematical exploration

Drawing the 1960’s Batman symbol with functions

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What I am going to do for this mathematic exploration is to draw the batman symbol

from the 1960s (See figure 1) using parabolic functions, polynomial functions and function

transformations. I will be using the graphing calculator from geogebra.org to graph the functions.

In a common parabolic function “y=x^2” or “-y=x^2”, what we see graphed is a “U”

shaped function facing down (See figure 2) or facing up (See figure 3). We can alter the shape of

this function by changing its coefficient, variable or exponent; for instance, if we change the

exponent of the “x” to a 3 instead of a 2 we get a function that looks like if half of the “U” was

flipped. (See figure 4)

Figure 1
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Fig. 2

Fig. 3
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Fig. 4

To make the head of the bat, I had to find a way to draw it with a single function, so it

doesn't look messy. For this process, I started with the fourth grade polynomial function

“y=x^4–2x^2”, which gave me an approximation to the result I was expecting. (See figure 4)

Fig. 5
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The first change I did to the function was to take out the “x^2” out of the parenthesis,

which made the parabola thinner, and then I changed the “y” to a “-y” so that the parabola was

facing up, after the changes, this was the function I ended with: “–y = (x^4 – 2x)^2” (See figure

6)

Fig. 6

My next goal was to make longer the spikes of the function that were going to be the ears

of the bat. What I did to fix that was to remove the second “x” from the function, living it just as

“–y = (x^4 – 2)^2” This change in the function made the “ears” grow about four times their

original size. (See figure 7)

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Fig. 7

Now that I had a shape that looked similar to the ears, I had to make them shorter and

make the gap between them bigger so that it matched the head of the bat in the original symbol.

After some experimentation, I decided to apply a square root to all the part of the function that

was after the equals sign “–y=sqrt((-x^(4)–2)^(2))”. This change solved the problem of the gap

between the ears of the bat, however, it also made the ears shorter than expected. (See figure 8)
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Fig. 8

To correct the issue of the short ears, I decided to multiply the part of the function that

was inside the squared root by “3”. This correction to the function turned out to be a success, and

it seemed it would not require further alterations. The function i used was:

“–y=sqrt(3(x^(4)–2)^(2))”. (See figure 9)

Fig. 9

With this function, I created the head of the batman symbol. The next thing I had to do

was to graph the curve that connected the head with the wings. My first idea was to use a wide

parabolic function, but then I realized that in the original symbol it is not a parabola, it looks

more like a straight line that curves at the ends. Taking this into account, I decided to use a

quartic polynomial function, I started with the function “y = x^(4) – 4.5”. By using “^4” I could

get the basic shape I was looking for, the straight line with curved ends. I used “-4.5” lo lower

the function, into its correct position. (See figure 10)

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Fig. 10

To make the function wider, I tried dividing “x” and it worked, but not as expected. I tried

dividing the function by small numbers, such as 2 or 5, but the changes were barely noticeable.

Then I decided to use tens, but it didn't make a great difference. When I had the function “y =

(x^(4))/50 – 5” the function was not wide enough yet, so I decided to divide “x” again to speed

up the process. The final function was “(((x^(4))/(50))/(20)) – 4.5” (See figure 11)
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Fig. 11

Then I decided to graph the wings. At first, I thought that I had to use two separate

functions for this, but then I realized that if you continue the lines, they eventually touch each

other, so I used the parabolic function: -y+2=((x^(2))/(25)). I used “-y” so that the function

would be facing up, and I added “/25” to the “x^(2)” so that the curvature of the function could

be wide enough to match the one in the original symbol. I finally added a “+2” to the “-y” to put

the function in the correct place. (See figure 12)

Fig. 12

At this moment, I noticed that the ears of the bat were too long, so I decided to alter the

head function one more time to make it more accurate. First, I decided to remove the 3 from the

function “–y=sqrt(3(x^(4)–2)^(2))” which made the “valley” of the function rise, but that wasn't

enough, the ears needed to be a bit shorter, so I changed the “-2” to “-1.5”. Now that I had the

ears the correct size, I just needed to make the entire function lower so that the head looked
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good. To achieve this, I added “+1.5” to the function, the final version of that funcion was

:-y=sqrt((x^(4)-1.5)^(2))+1.5 (See figure 13)

Fig. 13

The next step was to create the spikes that are at the bottom of the wings. For this, I used

two parabolic functions and their reflections in the “y” axis. First, I graphed one of the middle

parabolas that create the center spike, using the following formula: -y = (((x-6)^(2))/(7))+16. As

in previous functions, I used “-y” to make the parabola face up, then I added “+16” to lower it.

To move the function to the right, I used “(x-6)^(2)”, then I divided that by 7 to make the

parabola wider (See figure 14)

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Fig. 14

For the second parabola of the right side, I reused the previous function, but I used

“(x-18)^(2)” instead of “(x-6)^(2)” so that the parabola would be touching the orange parabola.

The final function was this “-y = (((x-18)^(2))/(7))+16” (See figure 15)

Fig. 15
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For the last two parabolas I reused the functions of the parabolas on the right, but I

replaced the subtractions of the “X” axis with additions so that the parabolas were on the left

side. (See figure 16)

The function of the purple parabola is: -y = (((x+6)^(2))/(7))+16

The function of the red parabola is: -y = (((x+18)^(2))/(7))+16

Fig. 16
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This is the final result after painting black the inside of the symbol (See figure 17)

Fig. 17

As a conclusion, I could say that this project turned out to be more challenging than I expected,

mostly because I was unfamiliar with the polynomial and quartic functions I used for the head of

the bat and the line that connects it to the wings. I think that the final result is similar enough to

the original symbol. But with more experimentation I could definitely make a more exact version

of the symbol
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Bibliography

Admin. (2019, October 24). Polynomial Functions- Definition, Formula, Types and Graph

With Examples. BYJUS; BYJU’S. https://byjus.com/maths/polynomial-functions/

Set of many Batman symbols. (2012). Batman Icon & logo. Retrieved April 5, 2022, from

http://logosociety.blogspot.com/2012/07/batman-icon-logo.html.

Polynomial Function - Definition, Formulas, Types, Graph. (2020). Cuemath.

https://www.cuemath.com/calculus/polynomial-functions/

Quartic Function / Curve: Definition, Examples - Calculus How To. (2022, February 22).

Calculus How To.

https://www.calculushowto.com/types-of-functions/quartic-function/