Is there any way to print the figure to the clipboard so that the quality is identical to what the Edit-->Copy Figure option provides?
I used to save the figure to powerpoint file by using saveppt.m obtained from Matlab Central. It worked well until yesterday. I noticed that the stored image quality was somehow degraded. I tried to re-generate some ppt slides with exactly the same script and the same source data, but the new slides are simply of worse quality.
I investigated into this problem a little bit and discovered that when the figure is copied to clipboard by running print -dmeta, the image in the clipboard is already degraded, while if I use the Edit-->Copy Figure option in the figure window, I get the image as clear as the original image in the figure window.
Following is an example for your reference. I copied the image from a figure to the clipboard by two different methods, and paste it to Microsoft Paint program, and cut a piece of it to show below:
The image using print -dmeta:
The image using Edit-->Copy Figure:
If you compare the Xtick label '50', you may see that the image from Edit-->Copy Figure is smoother.
At the beginning I thought it was a problem of the resolution, but setting -rN to change the resolution does not seem to resolve my problem, at least not for N<=300.
Thank you for your help.
The short answer... Use the same function invoked in the callback for that menu item:
editmenufcn(gcf,'EditCopyFigure');
The longer answer... How exactly did I find this? You can look at my previous answer to a related question about reproducing what is done by a File menu option. The concept is the same, just for a different figure menu. For example, this will find the callback you want for the currently active figure window:
>> hCopyFigure = findall(gcf,'Label','Copy &Figure'); %# Handle for the "Copy
%# Figure" menu item
>> get(hCopyFigure,'Callback') %# Callback invoked when that item is selected
ans =
editmenufcn(gcbf,'EditCopyFigure')
The function EDITMENUFCN is another one of those sparsely documented functions, but looking through the code (by typing edit editmenufcn.m) shows that it either invokes Java (if you're on a Mac) or the undocumented function UIMENUFCN.
I think I found the answer myself. Using print -dmeta -painters to specify the renderer resolves my problem.
In File-->Preference-->Figure Copy Template-->Copy Option I noticed there are 3 options:
Metafile
Preserve information
Bitmap
I found that if I select 1, the Edit-->Copy Figure outputs the same image as print -dmeta. So I kind of confirmed the information I need is in the Preserve information option. A quick google search led me to the discussion about the potential difference of the applied renderer, and eventually I confirmed that using painters will print the image to the clipboard in the way I wanted.
The image in the question seems to be generated by the renderer zbuffer and painters, respectively. I still don't know why the default renderer of paint -dmeta changes, though.
Related
I am using Export_fig to export figs from matlab, I am getting very good plots generally. But when i add some textboxs and arrows in the fig. the clarity is pathetic.
I use the -transparent property, which does not work either.
export_fig('path', '-pdf','-transparent')
Anyone knows what is happening here. Normally this works very good, only when the text is added it acts like this way. Not sure if it's a glitch in the code or if i am doing anything wrong.
Note: I added the text and arrows with insert option on the menu bar.
If you are not set on using Export_fig for other reasons, consider using MATLAB's built-in print function and increase the resolution with the -r attribute
print('path', '-dpdf', '-r300')
where 'path' is the desired 'path\filename.pdf', '-dpdf' sets the file type, and '-r300' sets the resolution to 300 dpi, also try '-r0' for screen resolution, or higher, till you get what you want.
I'm not sure what the '-transparent' argument is used for but there is probably an equivalent you can find in the documentation.
https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/print.html
I have made a Gui program that I compile to EXE application which lots csv file into graph data. I buit a save button but I do not know how save figure with different name each time cause (savefig anduisave both uses matlab program). I am posting my code below if anyoff you guys figure out how to save gui figue into image or anything that does require matlab to open. Last function is the callback function for save button.
function ma_Callback(hObject, eventdata, handles)
% i tried uisave but not possible to run computer without matlab cause mcr
% does not run uisave
% i tried copyopbj but since i did not put a name on my figure it did not
% work
%savefig
If you are trying to save a kind of image from your figure, then the best option which supports many aspects, is using print function.
I have already done this in a compiled app and it works perfect. Using print function you can set different file type(vector formats like *.svg are also supported), resolution(dpi), and so many others.
Although you can use print function directly on the figure, but I found that the best way (More Customization like removing or adding some objects and changing many options) is to follow this steps:
Create another figure with Visible='on' but a position that is out of screen with the same width and height of Main Figure.
normalized position = [-1, -1, ?, ?]. (Create this figure in start up and don't destroy it until your app exits, let call it Print Figure).
Copy your figure content (or the parts you are interested in) using copyobj to that figure (you may need to set Parent property of some key objects like panels to this new figure). They would look exactly as they look in the main figure, because they have the same properties. you can add or remove some objects in this step.
Change aspect ratio of "Print Figure" for a better output.
Print this figure with all options (file format, dpi, ...) you need. in my own GUI i allowed the user to change this settings with an input dialog.
In my app i used functions like winopen to show the output, and output directory to the user, when the print task was done. Print process takes some time, specially if dpi is huge, so it is also a good idea to inactivate buttons and show wait cursor.
Update:
a simple usage would be:
print(MainFigure, 'myFileName', '-dpng', '-r300')
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'm using the still undocumented HG2-Update to create my MATLAB plots, because they just look that much nicer.
(Source: Yair Altman)
Actually, using the current version Release 2013b it works quite nicely and there are not much issues. Except one wants to export the figures as vector graphics (renderer: '-painters'), especially as pdf.
I use the commands:
saveas(gcf,'test.pdf','pdf')
or
print(gcf,'test.pdf','-dpdf')
There are rendering issues, the print does not contain the whole figure and some parts are cropped or non-default fonts are not recognized.
But I'd really like to stay with HG2 and I'd still like to use vector graphics. Is there any solution or workaround?
Exporting vector graphics using the yet not official HG2-Update is quite an issue. The .pdf-export is still totally screwed up.
What is working fine is the .svg-export, apart from that the boundary box is not set properly.
The long workaround would be:
Save the plot with '-dsvg' (print-command) or 'svg' (saveas-command) as vector graphic, open the file in the open source application Inkscape and save again as .pdf with the Export area is drawing checkmark set.
Quite complicated, so I found a way to do it via command-line directly from Matlab (Inkscape still required!):
filename = 'test';
inkscapepath = '"C:\Program Files (x86)\Inkscape\inkscape.exe"';
%// save as .svg
saveas(gcf,filename,'svg')
%// open and save with "export-area-drawing" set via command line
system( [inkscapepath ' ' filename ...
'.svg --export-area-drawing --export-pdf=' filename '.pdf'])
It takes some time, but works without any known issues for now.
Additionally delete the svg-File afterwards:
delete([filename '.svg'])
I had the same problem and used the workaround from thewaywewalk. Now I discovered the MATLAB function "hgexport" works under HG2 (in R2014a).
An issue still was the paper size. I want to use the same size for all graphs with as little white frame as possible. Here you have to set two sizes:
The papersize is set with set(gcf,'PaperSize',[width height]) and the size of your chart is set through export styles. These are set in "Export Setup" or command line:
exp_style=hgexport('readstyle','default');
exp_style.Width = 'width';
exp_style.Height = 'height';
exp_style.Renderer = 'painters';
Now you can export your pdf:
hgexport(gcf,'pdfname',exp_style,'Format','pdf');
PS: In HG2 you may also use Latex for tick labels:
set(gca,'TickLabelInterpreter','latex');
I'm very new to Matlab, though I know a few other programming languages, so please forgive me if this is something simple. I have not been able to find any answers to this, either on StackOverflow or elsewhere.
I produce a figure using the following code:
figure(6),imageplot(P); drawnow;
Which looks like this:
I then save this image to my computer using the following commands:
imwrite(P, 'images/plot.png');
And the resulting image is tiny, and missing some of the color information:
If, however, I utilize the save function in the open figure (image #1) and save it manually, I get exactly what I want, which is that exact image stored on my computer.
How would I program that? I assumed that imwrite() would just write the image directly, but apparently I'm doing something wrong. Any advice? Perhaps it has something to do with the imageplot command? I cannot seem to get that to work in imwrite.
Update: Based on the comments below, I have begun using "imresize" with the "nearest" option. This scales the image properly, but the resulting image is still curiously darker (and therefore has less information) than if I hit the "save" button in the figure.
Image saved from figure:
Image using "imresize" with "nearest" option:
The MATLAB imwrite command saves exactly the number of pixels as specified in your image matrix. This is the actual result of your computation; the reason the output is "tiny" is because it is supposed to be. To make it larger, would be to simply scale/zoom it as required.
The save figure option however does something quite different: it rasterizes the the output you obtain in the figure window and gives you the option for saving it as an image. This is evident in the fact that when you do so, you obtain a white background in addition to your result which is really just the grey background you see before you save it; this can be adjusted by resizing the figure window before utilizing the save option.
If you're looking to simply make the output figure larger, I would recommend using something along the lines of the imresize command.
Say, if you want the default size to be twice the size of the real result, simply use:
imresize(P, 2.0);
For more options, try help imresize.
The command you need for the "Save As..." functionality of figures is called "print". I often use
print(gcf, '-dpng', 'some_filename.png')
or
print(gcf, '-depsc', 'some_filename.eps','-r0')
to save a figure as it is shown on screen. The format png offers a small filesize and excellent quality, and it is understood by most image viewers and browsers. The eps format is a vector format, which I use for printig. The '-r0' option specifies "use the same size as given by the screen resolution" for the vector format properties.