I want to include Matlab figures in a Powerpoint presentation. [Note that in other contexts, I usually use LaTeX beamer with .eps files, but here I am obliged to use Powerpoint.]
I know two ways:
Save the image as e.g. a .tiff file and include the image in Powerpoint. The result does not always look sharp and some lines are too thin.
Copy the image directly in Matlab and paste it in Powerpoint. The resulting figure is way nicer. But after exporting the Powerpoint to pdf, it may take some time to load the figure (especially when you included grid minor).
What is the difference between these two methods: is it the well-known bitmap vs. vector image difference or something else? Is there a way to have the quality of the second method but without the problem that is loads slowly?
Related
I have generated several plots in MATLAB and I haven't set the ( width or height) to any of them. I save them as pdf to place them in LaTeX but each figure appear with different size. I can change each figure size in LaTeX but I wonder if there is an easy way in MATLAB to get same size for all figures.
Can I reset the figure size after generating in MATLAB or I have to regenerate each figure with specific size?
What is the best way to export figures in MATLAB to use them in LaTeX?
Exporting figures from MATLAB to LaTeX is best done via .eps or directly to PDF. MATLAB's saveas() functionality supports both. The benefit of these file-types is that thy are vector files, meaning, loosely, that coordinates of corners in the lines are saved, as opposed to a bunch of fixed pixels such as with PNG or JPG figures. Using then these figures in LaTeX gives infinite scalability (theoretically, usefulness of highly-zoomed figures may vary).
If you need different aspect ratios, i.e. one figure taller than broad, the other broader than tall, You'd have to set the proper aspect ratio for each figure independently, then save using one of the aforementioned vector file types.
One of the best ways to export pretty figures is the export_fig() functionality written by Oliver Woodford and currently maintained by Yair Altman and freely available on the FileExchange.
Answering your first question: yes you can resize figures after generating them. Either by hand (change the window size), or programatically: you can make a figure handle (h=figure();, where h is your handle), which has several options to control figure size; h.position being the most prominent: [upper-left, lower-left, upper-right, lower-right] being its content in terms of corner coordinates. Changing those changes the figure size.
I am asking for a solution to the blurred image I get when I use copy figure option in Matlab. For example, when I plot 3d figure in matlab I get the following image (It is the result of printscreen!)..
However, when I use the option copy figure I get a blurred image as the following image
.
How can I avoid this as I need to get high resolution image using copy figure option. Thank you in advance for any help you may lend.
By default, the figure is copied as an Enhanced Metafile (a color graphics format) which works for basic plots such as bar plots, line plots, and other 2D plots but may yield undesirable results for more complex plots as in your case. This is because the rendering of the Metafile content is controlled my Microsoft Word and it may render things differently than MATLAB.
If you need a high resolution image, I would recommend using the print command where you can specify the desired resolution (using the -r option). Then you can import the resulting image into Word
print(gcf, 'myfile.png', '-dpng', '-r300')
Alternately, you can use export_fig from the File Exchange which better preserves the appearance
Another option would be to change the format used by Copy Figure to tell it to use a bitmap instead
Or you can call Copy Figure programmatically and specify a different format (either a bitmap or PDF)
print(gcf, '-clipboard', '-dpdf')
i know its a often discussed topic. But i haven't found any solution for me. I have some plots, which i need to import in Word 2013 afterwards the docx is saved as pdf.
The problem is:
If the plot gets saved (with the function print() ) as .eps or emf and imported in Word, the downsampled placeholder of the graphics look pretty poor and the graphics in pdf are no vector grapic anymore. They do get turned into a bitmap and by zooming in a bit, one can see the pixels. If i use Edit -> Copy Figure in the Matlab figure and paste it in Word, i get a nice graphic in Word as well as a nice vector based graphic in the pdf file.
Is there a way, to save a figure to a file and import it to Word and have the same quality like i have by copy and paste? What is the difference between these methods?
Thank you for your help.
Rafael
I normally save my matlab figures as .eps and then make them better looking using Adobe Illustrator. This works for most figures but not all.
For example I plotted my data using the violin.m function from file exchange. When I save it as .eps and open it in Illustrator, I don't get an editable figure as I usually do. Instead, My figure appears chopped in horizontal sections, and all I can do is delete them (like in the figure below).
Is there anything I can do in either matlab or Illustrator to be able to edit the figure?
I don't need an .eps file, I just need to be able to edit it.
EDITS:
I tried #MattSchmatt's suggestion of using the print2eps function but I had the same problem.
Saving as .pdf doesn't solve the problem, because the image I get is not editable in Illustrator (plus, I also get the horizontal 'chunks').
A minimal, complete and verifiable example requires matlab, the violin function linked above and illustrator. But if it helps, here's the matlab code to produce a similar figure. I save by clicking on Figure -> save as. (But as I said above I tried the print2eps function and that was the same).
X = rand(100,6);
figure; violin(X)
I tried the following, didn't work either.
set(gcf, 'Renderer', 'painters')
As the author of the question suggests, I also wasn't able to export an editable (vectorized) .eps file into Illustrator. However, exporting it as .pdf does the trick. The 'fill' for the violin plots is weird, though, and has horizontal sections (perhaps something to do with the way the density estimate is being plotted?) all over. I was able to fix this and make the plots normal (with solid filled shades): select all the horizontal sections/chunks using the magic wand tool, and then increase opacity to 100% (it is set to 50 based on the exported file). Once all the required edits are made, export the file as .tiff and it seems to look fine. Hope this replicates, and thus helps! (my MATLAB version is 2016, and Illustrator version is the CS5)
I've got an exported version of a MATLAB diagram, similar to the one below. The problem is, that there are no axis captions. It's not possible to export the file again from MATLAB. I need to edit the PDF programmatically and edit about 100 diagrams, all with the same axis positions.
Is there a clean and fast way to paste the Strings X and Y at the corresponding positions in the pdf based on a batch process?
Create a PDF file with the captions. Add that as a background with to the PDF files with pdftk.
if know how to use LaTeX, the pstool package can bring you far on this on, including replacing labels (or actually any text on an eps figure) with TeX symbolic expressions. Neat if you're already working in LaTeX.