matplotlib.spines

class matplotlib.spines.Spine(axes, spine_type, path, **kwargs)

Bases: Patch

An axis spine -- the line noting the data area boundaries.

Spines are the lines connecting the axis tick marks and noting the boundaries of the data area. They can be placed at arbitrary positions. See set_position for more information.

The default position is ('outward', 0).

Spines are subclasses of Patch, and inherit much of their behavior.

Spines draw a line, a circle, or an arc depending on if set_patch_line, set_patch_circle, or set_patch_arc has been called. Line-like is the default.

For examples see Spines.

Parameters:

axesAxes

The Axes instance containing the spine.

spine_typestr

The spine type.

pathPath

The Path instance used to draw the spine.

Other Parameters:

**kwargs

Valid keyword arguments are:

Property	Description
agg_filter	a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array and two offsets from the bottom left corner of the image
alpha	unknown
animated	bool
antialiased or aa	bool or None
capstyle	CapStyle or {'butt', 'projecting', 'round'}
clip_box	BboxBase or None
clip_on	bool
clip_path	Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
color	color
edgecolor or ec	color or None
facecolor or fc	color or None
figure	Figure or SubFigure
fill	bool
gid	str
hatch	{'/', '\', '|', '-', '+', 'x', 'o', 'O', '.', '*'}
hatch_linewidth	unknown
in_layout	bool
joinstyle	JoinStyle or {'miter', 'round', 'bevel'}
label	object
linestyle or ls	{'-', '--', '-.', ':', '', (offset, on-off-seq), ...}
linewidth or lw	float or None
mouseover	bool
path_effects	list of AbstractPathEffect
picker	None or bool or float or callable
rasterized	bool
sketch_params	(scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap	bool or None
transform	Transform
url	str
visible	bool
zorder	float

classmethod arc_spine(axes, spine_type, center, radius, theta1, theta2, **kwargs)

Create and return an arc Spine.

classmethod circular_spine(axes, center, radius, **kwargs)

Create and return a circular Spine.

clear()

Clear the current spine.

draw(renderer)

Draw the Artist (and its children) using the given renderer.

This has no effect if the artist is not visible (Artist.get_visible returns False).

Parameters:

rendererRendererBase subclass.

Notes

This method is overridden in the Artist subclasses.

get_bounds()

Get the bounds of the spine.

get_patch_transform()

Return the Transform instance mapping patch coordinates to data coordinates.

For example, one may define a patch of a circle which represents a radius of 5 by providing coordinates for a unit circle, and a transform which scales the coordinates (the patch coordinate) by 5.

get_path()

Return the path of this patch.

get_position()

Return the spine position.

get_spine_transform()

Return the spine transform.

get_window_extent(renderer=None)

Return the window extent of the spines in display space, including padding for ticks (but not their labels)

See also

matplotlib.axes.Axes.get_tightbbox

matplotlib.axes.Axes.get_window_extent

classmethod linear_spine(axes, spine_type, **kwargs)

Create and return a linear Spine.

register_axis(axis)

Register an axis.

An axis should be registered with its corresponding spine from the Axes instance. This allows the spine to clear any axis properties when needed.

set(*, agg_filter=<UNSET>, alpha=<UNSET>, animated=<UNSET>, antialiased=<UNSET>, bounds=<UNSET>, capstyle=<UNSET>, clip_box=<UNSET>, clip_on=<UNSET>, clip_path=<UNSET>, color=<UNSET>, edgecolor=<UNSET>, facecolor=<UNSET>, fill=<UNSET>, gid=<UNSET>, hatch=<UNSET>, hatch_linewidth=<UNSET>, in_layout=<UNSET>, joinstyle=<UNSET>, label=<UNSET>, linestyle=<UNSET>, linewidth=<UNSET>, mouseover=<UNSET>, patch_arc=<UNSET>, patch_circle=<UNSET>, path_effects=<UNSET>, picker=<UNSET>, position=<UNSET>, rasterized=<UNSET>, sketch_params=<UNSET>, snap=<UNSET>, transform=<UNSET>, url=<UNSET>, visible=<UNSET>, zorder=<UNSET>)

Set multiple properties at once.

Supported properties are

Property	Description
agg_filter	a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array and two offsets from the bottom left corner of the image
alpha	float or None
animated	bool
antialiased or aa	bool or None
bounds	(low: float, high: float)
capstyle	CapStyle or {'butt', 'projecting', 'round'}
clip_box	BboxBase or None
clip_on	bool
clip_path	Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
color	color
edgecolor or ec	color or None
facecolor or fc	color or None
figure	Figure or SubFigure
fill	bool
gid	str
hatch	{'/', '\', '|', '-', '+', 'x', 'o', 'O', '.', '*'}
hatch_linewidth	unknown
in_layout	bool
joinstyle	JoinStyle or {'miter', 'round', 'bevel'}
label	object
linestyle or ls	{'-', '--', '-.', ':', '', (offset, on-off-seq), ...}
linewidth or lw	float or None
mouseover	bool
patch_arc	unknown
patch_circle	unknown
path_effects	list of AbstractPathEffect
picker	None or bool or float or callable
position	unknown
rasterized	bool
sketch_params	(scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap	bool or None
transform	Transform
url	str
visible	bool
zorder	float

set_bounds(low=None, high=None)

Set the spine bounds.

Parameters:

lowfloat or None, optional

The lower spine bound. Passing None leaves the limit unchanged.

The bounds may also be passed as the tuple (low, high) as the first positional argument.

highfloat or None, optional

The higher spine bound. Passing None leaves the limit unchanged.

set_color(c)

Set the edgecolor.

Parameters:

ccolor

Notes

This method does not modify the facecolor (which defaults to "none"), unlike the Patch.set_color method defined in the parent class. Use Patch.set_facecolor to set the facecolor.

set_patch_arc(center, radius, theta1, theta2)

Set the spine to be arc-like.

set_patch_circle(center, radius)

Set the spine to be circular.

set_patch_line()

Set the spine to be linear.

set_position(position)

Set the position of the spine.

Spine position is specified by a 2 tuple of (position type, amount). The position types are:

• 'outward': place the spine out from the data area by the specified number of points. (Negative values place the spine inwards.)

• 'axes': place the spine at the specified Axes coordinate (0 to 1).

• 'data': place the spine at the specified data coordinate.

Additionally, shorthand notations define a special positions:

• 'center' -> ('axes', 0.5)

• 'zero' -> ('data', 0.0)

Examples

Spine placement

class matplotlib.spines.Spines(**kwargs)

Bases: MutableMapping

The container of all Spines in an Axes.

The interface is dict-like mapping names (e.g. 'left') to Spine objects. Additionally, it implements some pandas.Series-like features like accessing elements by attribute:

spines['top'].set_visible(False)
spines.top.set_visible(False)

Multiple spines can be addressed simultaneously by passing a list:

spines[['top', 'right']].set_visible(False)

Use an open slice to address all spines:

spines[:].set_visible(False)

The latter two indexing methods will return a SpinesProxy that broadcasts all set_*() and set() calls to its members, but cannot be used for any other operation.

classmethod from_dict(d)

class matplotlib.spines.SpinesProxy(spine_dict)

Bases: object

A proxy to broadcast set_*() and set() method calls to contained Spines.

The proxy cannot be used for any other operations on its members.

The supported methods are determined dynamically based on the contained spines. If not all spines support a given method, it's executed only on the subset of spines that support it.