Graphics

Enclosing Regions of a Graph in a Rectangle or an Ellipse

You can add a rectangle or an ellipse to draw attention to a specific region of a graph. While either object is selected, you can move and resize it as well as display a right-click context menu that enables you to modify behavior and appearance.

Insert the rectangle or ellipse by clicking the corresponding icon in the plot edit toolbar

or by selecting Rectangle or Ellipse from the Insert menu. MATLAB changes the cursor to a cross indicating you can click down, drag, and release the left mouse button to define the size and shape of the object.

Pinning Rectangles and Ellipses

You can attach the rectangle to a particular point in the figure by pinning it to that point. There are three ways to pin the rectangle:

• Right-click on the rectangle to display its context menu.
• Select the pin icon in the figure toolbar (see Pinning -- Attaching to a Point in the Figure).
• Select Pin Object from the Edit menu.

By default, pinning attaches the lower left corner of the rectangle or ellipse to its current location in the axes data units. You can move the point of attachment by clicking on the corner and dragging the anchor to another point. The cursor changes to a pin while you are dragging.

Note that you cannot drag or resize a rectangle or an ellipse when it is pinned.

Modifying the Rectangle or Ellipse from the Context Menu

Right-click on the rectangle or ellipse to display its context menu.

The menu contains the following options:

• Cut, Copy, Delete -- Cut to clipboard, copy to clipboard, or delete the selected object.
• Pin to axes -- Pin the lower left corner to the current location (you can move the point of attachment by clicking and dragging the point while in plot edit mode).
• Unpin -- Detach the rectangle from the attachment point.
• Face Color -- Fill color for the rectangle or ellipse
• Edge Color -- Color of the line used to draw the rectangle or ellipse
• Line Width -- Width of the line used to draw the rectangle or ellipse
• Line Style -- Type of line used to draw the rectangle or ellipse
• Properties -- Display the Property Editor with textbox properties.
• Show M-code -- Create M-code that recreates the graph.

Setting Rectangle and Ellipse Properties

You can use the Property Editor to set rectangle and ellipse properties by selecting Properties from the context menu. The Property Editor displays the same properties that are described above in the context menu section.

You can click the Inspector button on the Property Editor to display the Property Inspector. The Property Inspector displays all properties for the selected annotation object. However, you should not change some of these properties because doing so can affect the proper functioning of the annotation object. See the following sections for descriptions of the properties you can change on the respective objects.

• Annotation Rectangle Properties
• Annotation Ellipse Properties

How to Annotate Graphs

Textbox Annotations

© 1994-2005 The MathWorks, Inc.