How to animate a time-ordered sequence of matplotlib plots

Question

I want to plot a sequence of .png images in matplotlib. The goal is to plot them rapidly to simulate the effect of a movie, but I have additional reasons for wanting to avoi

Answer 1

The best way I have found for this was with the command pylab.ion() after you import pylab.

Here is a script that does use show(), but which displays the different plots each time pylab.draw() is called, and which leaves the plot windows showing indefinitely. It uses simple input logic to decide when to close the figures (because using show() means pylab won't process clicks on the windows x button), but that should be simple to add to your gui as another button or as a text field.

import numpy as np
import pylab
pylab.ion()

def get_fig(fig_num, some_data, some_labels):

    fig = pylab.figure(fig_num,figsize=(8,8),frameon=False)
    ax = fig.add_subplot(111)
    ax.set_ylim([0.1,0.8]); ax.set_xlim([0.1, 0.8]);
    ax.set_title("Quarterly Stapler Thefts")
    ax.pie(some_data, labels=some_labels, autopct='%1.1f%%', shadow=True);
    return fig

my_labels = ("You", "Me", "Some guy", "Bob")

# To ensure first plot is always made.
do_plot = 1; num_plots = 0;

while do_plot:
    num_plots = num_plots + 1;
    data = np.random.rand(1,4).tolist()[0]

    fig = get_fig(num_plots,data,my_labels)
    fig.canvas.draw()
    pylab.draw()

    print "Close any of the previous plots? If yes, enter its number, otherwise enter 0..."
    close_plot = raw_input()

    if int(close_plot) > 0:
        pylab.close(int(close_plot))

    print "Create another random plot? 1 for yes; 0 for no."
    do_plot = raw_input();

    # Don't allow plots to go over 10.
    if num_plots > 10:
        do_plot = 0

pylab.show()

By modifying the basic logic here, I can have it close windows and plot images consecutively to simulate playing a movie, or I can maintain keyboard control over how it steps through the movie.

Note: This has worked for me across platforms and seems strictly superior to the window canvas manager approach above, and doesn't require the 'TkAgg' option.