colorbar (MATLAB Functions)

Display colorbar showing the color scale

Syntax

colorbar
colorbar(...,'peer',axes_handle)
colorbar(axes_handle)
colorbar('location')
colorbar(...,'PropertyName',propertyvalue)
cbar_axes = colorbar(...)

Description

The colorbar function displays the current colormap in the current figure and resizes the current axes to accommodate the colorbar.

colorbar updates the most recently created colorbar or, when the current axes does not have a colorbar, colorbar adds a new vertical colorbar.

colorbar(...,'peer',axes_handle) creates a colorbar associated with the axes axes_handle instead of the current axes.

colorbar(axes_handle) adds the colorbar to the axes axes_handle in the default (right) orientation.

colorbar(...,'location') adds a colorbar in the specified orientation with respect to the axes. Possible values for location are

North -- inside plot box near top
South -- inside bottom
East -- inside right
West -- inside left
NorthOutside -- outside plotbox near top
SouthOutside -- outside bottom
EastOutside -- outside right
WestOutside -- outside left

Using one of the ...Outside values for location assure that the colorbar will not overlap the plot, whereas overlaps can occur when you specify any of the other four values.

colorbar(...,'PropertyName',propertyvalue) specifies property names and values for the axes object used to create the colorbar. See axes properties for a description of the properties you can set. The location property applies only to colorbars and legends, not to axes.

cbar_axes = colorbar(...) returns a handle to the colorbar, which is an axes graphics object that contains one additional property, Location.

Remarks

You can use colorbar with 2-D and 3-D plots.

Examples

Display a colorbar beside the axes and use descriptive text strings as y-tick labels.

surf(peaks(30))
colorbar('YTickLabel',...
    {'Freezing','Cold','Cool','Neutral','Warm','Hot','Burning'})

See Also

colormap

Color Operations for related functions

colmmd colordef