1. The sinusoidal time variation of the currents in the three phases (identified as red, blue, and green), where a cross ("X") stands for an incoming current and a dot ("·") stands for an outgoing current.

2. The sinusoidal time variation of the magnetic fields generated by said currents (identified with the same colors).

3. The vector composition of the three magnetic fields, resulting in a rotating magnetic field.

The resultant can be hidden, and its rotation can be inverted. For the superposition principle to hold when adding field vectors, saturation effects are neglected.