How to print figure precisely to A4 without scale

Hi,

Firstly thanks to anyone who can help me with this problem.

I have a program for academic work that produces some figures. On these figures are measurements that I would like to be precisely the same as on the paper that I print it from. However after several attempts from online research (paper type, orientation, size) I cannot get the axis measurement to be true to when I measure it on paper (with a ruler) therefore affecting the size of my figure.

Is there a specific way to export to a printable file (as this PC does not have direct printing links) that I can print to typical A4 and the measurements will match up.

In terms of coding all I have is, the rest I tried to change in the sub-menus:

figure,plot(w,-al,-w,-al)

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

[per isakson]

Did you search for a solution in the File Exchange? export_fig is the "Most Popular" download.

I have an old m-function, A4Paper, which I use now and then. It produces a figure, the size of A4-paper, on screen. It allows me to position axes using centimeters and when printed on paper size and location on the printed paper agrees "exactly" with those given. E.g.

    ohf = A4Paper( 'create', 'sa4' );
    U   = get( gcf, 'UserData' );
    axes( 'pos', U.p2d.*[ 3, 3, 8, 8 ] )

and File menu, Print gives me a printout on which I can use a ruler. Both axes are 80 mm long as far as I can measured with my old plastic ruler.

However, I fail to print to a file. I tried to print to the Adobe PDF printer, and a couple of variants with the function, print. On paper they end up some 5% to small. The margins are increased and the printing area is decreased.

This makes me tired.

I've mailed A4Paper to you via [Contact Craig]. You might want to delete it together with other spam.

[Craig]

Hi per isakson,

I have emailed you as well. I obtained a "screen ruler" for the computer and I notice that on 100% in Matlab the figure axis does not seem to represent any dimension I am familiar with. The axis reads 0.05 (function calculated from metres) yet when I measure it is roughly 3.75cm with the screen rule.

I obtained a connection to a printer but every attempt leads back to the discrepancy in measurement.

Answer 2

[Michael Wagner]

G'day Craig,

After a weekend of trials and errors, I found the following code to work for my problem of printing a 10cm square to paper with precise dimensions:

f=figure(1);
f.Units='centimeters';
f.Position(3:4)=[10,10];
f.PaperType="A4";
f.PaperUnits="centimeters";
fig.PaperPosition(3:4)=[10,10];
get(f)                  %get list of all figure properties

R = [0,10,10, 0,0       %Plot rectangle of size 10cm x 10cm
     0, 0,10,10,0];
plot(R(1,:),R(2,:))

a=gca;
a.Units='centimeters';
a.XLim=[0,10];
a.YLim=[0,10];
a.InnerPosition(3:4)=[10,10];
a.PlotBoxAspectRatio=[1 1 1];
get(a)                  %get list of all axes properties

[Michael Wagner]

Delete Line 6, starting with fig.PaperPosition, and make Lines 4 & 5 prettier with single quotes.