""" =========================================== Blend transparency with color in 2-D images =========================================== Blend transparency with color to highlight parts of data with imshow. A common use for `matplotlib.pyplot.imshow` is to plot a 2-D statistical map. The function makes it easy to visualize a 2-D matrix as an image and add transparency to the output. For example, one can plot a statistic (such as a t-statistic) and color the transparency of each pixel according to its p-value. This example demonstrates how you can achieve this effect. First we will generate some data, in this case, we'll create two 2-D "blobs" in a 2-D grid. One blob will be positive, and the other negative. """ # sphinx_gallery_thumbnail_number = 3 import numpy as np import matplotlib.pyplot as plt from matplotlib.colors import Normalize def normal_pdf(x, mean, var): return np.exp(-(x - mean)**2 / (2*var)) # Generate the space in which the blobs will live xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax = (0, 100, 0, 100) n_bins = 100 xx = np.linspace(xmin, xmax, n_bins) yy = np.linspace(ymin, ymax, n_bins) # Generate the blobs. The range of the values is roughly -.0002 to .0002 means_high = [20, 50] means_low = [50, 60] var = [150, 200] gauss_x_high = normal_pdf(xx, means_high[0], var[0]) gauss_y_high = normal_pdf(yy, means_high[1], var[0]) gauss_x_low = normal_pdf(xx, means_low[0], var[1]) gauss_y_low = normal_pdf(yy, means_low[1], var[1]) weights = (np.outer(gauss_y_high, gauss_x_high) - np.outer(gauss_y_low, gauss_x_low)) # We'll also create a grey background into which the pixels will fade greys = np.full((*weights.shape, 3), 70, dtype=np.uint8) # First we'll plot these blobs using ``imshow`` without transparency. vmax = np.abs(weights).max() imshow_kwargs = { 'vmax': vmax, 'vmin': -vmax, 'cmap': 'RdYlBu', 'extent': (xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax), } fig, ax = plt.subplots() ax.imshow(greys) ax.imshow(weights, **imshow_kwargs) ax.set_axis_off() ############################################################################### # Blending in transparency # ======================== # # The simplest way to include transparency when plotting data with # `matplotlib.pyplot.imshow` is to pass an array matching the shape of # the data to the ``alpha`` argument. For example, we'll create a gradient # moving from left to right below. # Create an alpha channel of linearly increasing values moving to the right. alphas = np.ones(weights.shape) alphas[:, 30:] = np.linspace(1, 0, 70) # Create the figure and image # Note that the absolute values may be slightly different fig, ax = plt.subplots() ax.imshow(greys) ax.imshow(weights, alpha=alphas, **imshow_kwargs) ax.set_axis_off() ############################################################################### # Using transparency to highlight values with high amplitude # ========================================================== # # Finally, we'll recreate the same plot, but this time we'll use transparency # to highlight the extreme values in the data. This is often used to highlight # data points with smaller p-values. We'll also add in contour lines to # highlight the image values. # Create an alpha channel based on weight values # Any value whose absolute value is > .0001 will have zero transparency alphas = Normalize(0, .3, clip=True)(np.abs(weights)) alphas = np.clip(alphas, .4, 1) # alpha value clipped at the bottom at .4 # Create the figure and image # Note that the absolute values may be slightly different fig, ax = plt.subplots() ax.imshow(greys) ax.imshow(weights, alpha=alphas, **imshow_kwargs) # Add contour lines to further highlight different levels. ax.contour(weights[::-1], levels=[-.1, .1], colors='k', linestyles='-') ax.set_axis_off() plt.show() ax.contour(weights[::-1], levels=[-.0001, .0001], colors='k', linestyles='-') ax.set_axis_off() plt.show() ############################################################################# # # ------------ # # References # """""""""" # # The use of the following functions, methods and classes is shown # in this example: import matplotlib matplotlib.axes.Axes.imshow matplotlib.pyplot.imshow matplotlib.axes.Axes.contour matplotlib.pyplot.contour matplotlib.colors.Normalize matplotlib.axes.Axes.set_axis_off