Re: [Matplotlib-users] Controlling spacing between subplots

[Benjamin R. <ben...@ou...>]

On Tue, Sep 20, 2011 at 11:06 AM, Brad Malone <bra...@gm...> wrote:

> Hi Jeffrey,
>
> Thanks the response. Sorry about the term "global axis". That was clearly
> not the best way to say it. What I meant to say is global x axis LABEL and
> y-axis LABEL. This can be seen in this example (
> http://www.scipy.org/Cookbook/Matplotlib/Multiple_Subplots_with_One_Axis_Label?action=AttachFile&do=get&target=Same_ylabel_subplots.png
> )
>
> although when I tried to do something similar with a 2x2 grid of plots it
> didn't seem to be working for me. Their example works due to these lines
> here
>
>   import pylab
>>    2
>>    3 figprops = dict(figsize=(8., 8. / 1.618), dpi=128)
>>                        # Figure properties
>>    4 adjustprops = dict(left=0.1, bottom=0.1, right=0.97, top=0.93,
>> wspace=0.2 hspace=0.2)       # Subplot properties
>>    5
>>    6 fig = pylab.figure(**figprops)
>>                        # New figure
>>    7 fig.subplots_adjust(**adjustprops)
>>                        # Tunes the subplot layout
>>    8
>>    9 ax = fig.add_subplot(3, 1, 1)
>>   10 bx = fig.add_subplot(3, 1, 2, sharex=ax, sharey=ax)
>>   11 cx = fig.add_subplot(3, 1, 3, sharex=ax, sharey=ax)
>>   12
>>   13 ax.plot([0,1,2], [2,3,4], 'k-')
>>   14 bx.plot([0,1,2], [2,3,4], 'k-')
>>   15 cx.plot([0,1,2], [2,3,4], 'k-')
>>   16
>>   17 pylab.setp(ax.get_xticklabels(), visible=False)
>>   18 pylab.setp(bx.get_xticklabels(), visible=False)
>>   19
>>   20 bx.set_ylabel('This is a long label shared among more axes',
>> fontsize=14)
>>   21 cx.set_xlabel('And a shared x label', fontsize=14)
>
>
>
> specifically probably the bx/cx_set label commands coupled with the sharex
> commands in the subplot label. But when I tried to add these things for my
> 2x2 plot it always looked like the label was attached to one of the plots or
> another instead of spanning the whole range.
>
> Thanks,
> Brad
>
>
Maybe the label_outer() function will be what you need.  Call it for each
subplot axes, and set the labels as you would normally.  matplotlib would
then set visible only the labels that are on the outside edge.

Another option is to use the AxesGrid1 toolkit, which makes these things
easy.  Also note that the soon-to-be released v1.1 will have a
tight_layout() function that can help with your spacing issues.

Cheers!
Ben Root