All the transformations below fix the origin. A planar rotation preserves lengths and angles and turns every vector through one common oriented angle. Its rotation matrix is
An orthogonal reflection in a line fixes that line and reverses its perpendicular direction; reflection in the horizontal axis has reflection matrix . A uniform dilation multiplies every vector by the same positive scale , represented by ; for example doubles lengths. A shear mapping fixes one line pointwise and shifts vectors parallel to that line by an amount proportional to their transverse coordinate. A horizontal shear mapping has matrix
with a nontrivial example.
The first given matrix is the clockwise planar rotation through , namely . Direct multiplication gives
Thus is a horizontal shear mapping of strength . Because ,
So is the composition of that shear mapping followed by an anticlockwise planar rotation through ; order matters. It is not individually one of the four elementary types under these definitions. In particular, its determinant is , but it is not an orthogonal matrix, excluding both a planar rotation and an orthogonal reflection. It is not a scalar matrix, excluding a uniform dilation; its eigenvalues and exclude a pure shear mapping, whose eigenvalues are both . As a symmetric positive-definite matrix, can also be described as stretching two perpendicular principal directions by these reciprocal factors, preserving area.
Shear mapping 2026-10-07
A horizontal shear fixes the horizontal axis pointwise and sends to . Its determinant is one and both eigenvalues are one. A nonzero shear preserves area but generally changes lengths and angles. Composing a shear with a planar rotation can produce a symmetric stretch; having determinant one alone does not make a linear map a shear.