I'm writing a script to generate three plots in a column (using multiplot and setting margins). They all share an x-axis, so it's only necessary to label that on the bottom plot, but they have separate y-axes.
I'm using the epslatex terminal in gnuplot to generate the plots with latex labels and axes. Basically, I need the numbers on the axis to use a smaller font size than the actual axis labels. So far, I've been doing this using,
reset
set term epslatex standalone color solid 10
set output 'myplot.tex'
set multiplot;
#Common width for all three plots is set
set lmargin at screen 0.15;
set rmargin at screen 0.90;
set format x ""; #Removes xlabels from plots without removing tic marks
#First plot
set tmargin at screen 0.98;
set bmargin at screen 0.72;
set ylabel '$Label Name 1$';
set format y '\scriptsize{%g}';
plot "mydata.dat" u 1:3 w l lt 1 lw 3
#Second plot
set tmargin at screen 0.70;
set bmargin at screen 0.44;
set ylabel '$Label Name 2$';
set format y '\scriptsize{%g}';
plot "mydata.dat" u 1:11 w l lt 2 lw 3
#Third plot
set tmargin at screen 0.42;
set bmargin at screen 0.16;
set xlabel 'Common Label Name';
set format x '\scriptsize{%g}'; # Here I reset the x axis so it shows on
this plot
set ylabel 'Label Name 3';
set format y '\scriptsize{%g}';
plot "mydata.dat" u 1:5 w l lt 3 lw 3
unset multiplot;
So as you can see I use latex to format the numbers in a different size, specifically \scriptsize. For the xlabel at the end, everything works fine; the numbers are at a smaller font, and the xlabel prints just beneath it at the regular size. For the ylabels, however, the numbers DO appear smaller, but the actual label names don't appear on the plot.
At first I though they weren't being acknowledged somehow, but when I experimented with the margins, I found that if I move lmargin to the middle of the page, the ylabels reappear! It seems, for whatever reason, they're just being drawn some large distance from the axes themselves.
I've tried setting the labels with an offset, but that yields no joy.