CODEWITHSUNDEEP
rmatlabplotggplot2plyr
Ben J
Ben J

Reputation: 1387

How can I overlay two dense scatter plots so that I can see the outlines of each in R or Matlab?

See this exampleExample of overlaid scatter plots

This was created in matlab by making two scatter plots independently, creating images of each, then using the imagesc to draw them into the same figure and then finally setting the alpha of the top image to 0.5.

I would like to do this in R or matlab without using images, since creating an image does not preserve the axis scale information, nor can I overlay a grid (e.g. using 'grid on' in matlab). Ideally I wold like to do this properly in matlab, but would also be happy with a solution in R. It seems like it should be possible but I can't for the life of me figure it out.

So generally, I would like to be able to set the alpha of an entire plotted object (i.e. of a matlab plot handle in matlab parlance...)

Thanks,

Ben.

EDIT: The data in the above example is actually 2D. The plotted points are from a computer simulation. Each point represents 'amplitude' (y-axis) (an emergent property specific to the simulation I'm running), plotted against 'performance' (x-axis).

EDIT 2: There are 1796400 points in each data set.

Upvotes: 13

Views: 5449

Answers (4)

Paul Hiemstra
Paul Hiemstra

Reputation: 60984

Using ggplot2 you can add together two geom_point's and make them transparent using the alpha parameter. ggplot2 als adds up transparency, and I think this is what you want. This should work, although I haven't run this.

dat = data.frame(x = runif(1000), y = runif(1000), cat = rep(c("A","B"), each = 500))
ggplot(aes(x = x, y = y, color = cat), data = dat) + geom_point(alpha = 0.3)

ggplot2 is awesome!

This is an example of calculating and drawing a convex hull:

library(automap)
library(ggplot2)
library(plyr)
loadMeuse()
theme_set(theme_bw())

meuse = as.data.frame(meuse)
chull_per_soil = ddply(meuse, .(soil), 
           function(sub) sub[chull(sub$x, sub$y),c("x","y")])

ggplot(aes(x = x, y = y), data = meuse) +
  geom_point(aes(size = log(zinc), color = ffreq)) +
  geom_polygon(aes(color = soil), data = chull_per_soil, fill = NA) +
  coord_equal()

which leads to the following illustration:

enter image description here

Upvotes: 11

baptiste
baptiste

Reputation: 77116

You could first export the two data sets as bitmap images, re-import them, add transparency:

overlay

library(grid)

N <- 1e7 # Warning: slow
d <- data.frame(x1=rnorm(N),
                x2=rnorm(N, 0.8, 0.9),
                y=rnorm(N, 0.8, 0.2),
                z=rnorm(N, 0.2, 0.4))

v <- with(d, dataViewport(c(x1,x2),c(y, z)))

png("layer1.png", bg="transparent")
with(d, grid.points(x1,y, vp=v,default="native",pch=".",gp=gpar(col="blue")))
dev.off()
png("layer2.png", bg="transparent")
with(d, grid.points(x2,z, vp=v,default="native",pch=".",gp=gpar(col="red")))
dev.off()

library(png)
i1 <- readPNG("layer1.png", native=FALSE)
i2 <- readPNG("layer2.png", native=FALSE)

ghostize <- function(r, alpha=0.5)
  matrix(adjustcolor(rgb(r[,,1],r[,,2],r[,,3],r[,,4]), alpha.f=alpha), nrow=dim(r)[1])

grid.newpage()
grid.rect(gp=gpar(fill="white"))
grid.raster(ghostize(i1))
grid.raster(ghostize(i2))

you can add these as layers in, say, ggplot2.

Upvotes: 5

Superbest
Superbest

Reputation: 26612

AFAIK, your best option with Matlab is to just make your own plot function. The scatter plot points unfortunately do not yet have a transparency attribute so you cannot affect it. However, if you create, say, most crudely, a bunch of loops which draw many tiny circles, you can then easily give them an alpha value and obtain a transparent set of data points.

Upvotes: 0

Carl Witthoft
Carl Witthoft

Reputation: 21532

Use the transparency capability of color descriptions. You can define a color as a sequence of four 2-byte words: muddy <- "#888888FF" . The first three pairs set the RGB colors (00 to FF); the final pair sets the transparency level.

Upvotes: 0

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