Zoom region within a plot in Matlab

Question

I'm using Matlab to produce figures, and I'm wondering if there is a way to plot a zoomed region in a figure of the overall data?

I have scatter data plotted over one week, with the x-axis in hours, and I want to zoom into the first 3 hours, and display them within the main figure with the x-axis label of minutes.

The plotting code I have so far is as follows:

allvalsx = marabint(:,2)
allvalsy = marabint(:,5)
subvalsx = marabint(1:7,2);
subvalsy = marabint(1:7,2);
%% Plots the scatter chart.
sizemarker = 135
handle = scatter(allvalsx, allvalsy, sizemarker, '.')
figure(1)
axes('Position',[.2 .2 .2 .2])
handle2 = scatter(subvalsx, subvalsy, '.r')
title(plotTitle)
xlabel('Time since treatment (hours)')
ylabel('Contact angle (deg)')

% Axis scales x1, x2, y1, y2
axis([0, marabint(length(marabint),2) + 10, 0, 120]);

% This adds a red horizontal line indicating the untreated angle of the
% sample.
untreatedLine = line('XData', [0 marabint(length(marabint),2) + 10], 'YData', [untreatedAngle untreatedAngle], 'LineStyle', '-', ...
    'LineWidth', 1, 'Color','r');

% Adding a legend to the graph
legendInfo = horzcat('Untreated angle of ', untreatedString)
hleg1 = legend(untreatedLine, legendInfo);

% This encases the plot in a box
    a = gca;
    % set box property to off and remove background color
    set(a,'box','off','color','none')
    % create new, empty axes with box but without ticks
    b = axes('Position',get(a,'Position'),'box','on','xtick',[],'ytick',[]);
    % set original axes as active
    axes(a)
    % link axes in case of zooming
    linkaxes([a b])

set(gcf,'PaperUnits','inches');
set(gcf,'PaperSize', [8.267 5.25]);
set(gcf,'PaperPosition',[0 0.2625 8.267 4.75]);
set(gcf,'PaperPositionMode','Manual');
set(handle,'Marker','.');
print(gcf, '-dpdf', '-r150', horzcat('markertest4.pdf'));

This produces the following enter image description here

Can anyone help me out with this?

Justin Fletcher Justin Fletcher · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-26T13:49:30

yeah, I think I know what you need. Try this:

zoomStart = 0;
zoomStop = 3;
set(gca, 'XLim', [zoomStart zoomStop])

Let me know if that doesn't do what you need, and I'll give you a different way.

Zoom region within a plot in Matlab

1 Answers