.. _sphx_glr_tutorials_intermediate_color_cycle.py:


===================
Styling with cycler
===================

Demo of custom property-cycle settings to control colors and other style
properties for multi-line plots.

.. note::

    More complete documentation of the ``cycler`` API can be found
    `here <http://matplotlib.org/cycler/>`_.

This example demonstrates two different APIs:

1. Setting the default rc parameter specifying the property cycle.
   This affects all subsequent axes (but not axes already created).
2. Setting the property cycle for a single pair of axes.




.. code-block:: python

    from cycler import cycler
    import numpy as np
    import matplotlib.pyplot as plt







First we'll generate some sample data, in this case, four offset sine
curves.



.. code-block:: python

    x = np.linspace(0, 2 * np.pi, 50)
    offsets = np.linspace(0, 2 * np.pi, 4, endpoint=False)
    yy = np.transpose([np.sin(x + phi) for phi in offsets])







Now ``yy`` has shape



.. code-block:: python

    print(yy.shape)





.. rst-class:: sphx-glr-script-out

 Out::

    (50, 4)


So ``yy[:, i]`` will give you the ``i``-th offset sine curve. Let's set the
default prop_cycle using :func:`matplotlib.pyplot.rc`. We'll combine a color
cycler and a linestyle cycler by adding (``+``) two ``cycler``'s together.
See the bottom of this tutorial for more information about combining
different cyclers.



.. code-block:: python

    default_cycler = cycler('color', ['r', 'g', 'b', 'y']) \
                        + cycler('linestyle', ['-', '--', ':', '-.'])

    plt.rc('lines', linewidth=4)
    plt.rc('axes', prop_cycle=default_cycler)







Now we'll generate a figure with two axes, one on top of the other. On the
first axis, we'll plot with the default cycler. On the second axis, we'll
set the prop_cycler using :func:`matplotlib.axes.Axes.set_prop_cycle`
which will only set the ``prop_cycle`` for this :mod:`matplotlib.axes.Axes`
instance. We'll use a second ``cycler`` that combines a color cycler and a
linewidth cycler.



.. code-block:: python

    custom_cycler = cycler('color', ['c', 'm', 'y', 'k']) \
        + cycler('lw', [1, 2, 3, 4])

    fig, (ax0, ax1) = plt.subplots(nrows=2)
    ax0.plot(yy)
    ax0.set_title('Set default color cycle to rgby')
    ax1.set_prop_cycle(custom_cycler)
    ax1.plot(yy)
    ax1.set_title('Set axes color cycle to cmyk')

    # Add a bit more space between the two plots.
    fig.subplots_adjust(hspace=0.3)
    plt.show()




.. image:: /tutorials/intermediate/images/sphx_glr_color_cycle_001.png
    :align: center




Setting ``prop_cycler`` in the ``matplotlibrc`` file or style files
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Remember, if you want to set a custom ``prop_cycler`` in your
``.matplotlibrc`` file or a style file (``style.mplstyle``), you can set the
``axes.prop_cycle`` property:

..code-block:: python

   axes.prop_cycle    : cycler('color', 'bgrcmyk')

Cycling through multiple properties
-----------------------------------

You can add cyclers:

.. code-block:: python

   from cycler import cycler
   cc = (cycler(color=list('rgb')) +
         cycler(linestyle=['-', '--', '-.']))
   for d in cc:
       print(d)

Results in:

.. code-block:: python

    {'color': 'r', 'linestyle': '-'}
    {'color': 'g', 'linestyle': '--'}
    {'color': 'b', 'linestyle': '-.'}


You can multiply cyclers:

.. code-block:: python

    from cycler import cycler
    cc = (cycler(color=list('rgb')) *
          cycler(linestyle=['-', '--', '-.']))
    for d in cc:
        print(d)

Results in:

.. code-block:: python

    {'color': 'r', 'linestyle': '-'}
    {'color': 'r', 'linestyle': '--'}
    {'color': 'r', 'linestyle': '-.'}
    {'color': 'g', 'linestyle': '-'}
    {'color': 'g', 'linestyle': '--'}
    {'color': 'g', 'linestyle': '-.'}
    {'color': 'b', 'linestyle': '-'}
    {'color': 'b', 'linestyle': '--'}
    {'color': 'b', 'linestyle': '-.'}




.. only :: html

 .. container:: sphx-glr-footer
    :class: sphx-glr-footer-example


  .. container:: binder-badge

    .. image:: https://static.mybinder.org/badge.svg
      :target: https://mybinder.org/v2/gh/choldgraf/matplotlib/gh-pages?filepath=_downloads/color_cycle.ipynb
      :width: 150 px


  .. container:: sphx-glr-download

     :download:`Download Python source code: color_cycle.py <color_cycle.py>`



  .. container:: sphx-glr-download

     :download:`Download Jupyter notebook: color_cycle.ipynb <color_cycle.ipynb>`


.. only:: html

 .. rst-class:: sphx-glr-signature

    `Gallery generated by Sphinx-Gallery <https://sphinx-gallery.readthedocs.io>`_