The basics

The underlying drawing model is that you make shapes, and add points to paths, and these are filled and/or stroked, using the current graphics state, which specifies colors, line thicknesses, scale, orientation, opacity, and so on. You can modify the current graphics state by transforming/rotating/scaling it, and setting style parameters, and so on. Subsequent graphics use the new state, but the graphics you've already drawn are unchanged. The gsave() and grestore() functions (or the @layer .... macro) let you create new temporary graphics states,

You can specify points on the drawing surface using Point(x, y). The default origin is at the top left of the drawing area, but you can reposition it at any time. Many of the drawing functions have an action argument. This can be :none, :fill, :stroke, :fillstroke, :fillpreserve, :strokepreserve, :clip, or :path. The default is :none.

Y coordinates increase downwards, so Point(0, 100) is below Point(0, 0). This is the preferred coordinate system for most computer graphics software, but mathematicians and scientists may well be used to the other convention, where the y-axis increasing up the page...

The main types you'll encounter in Luxor are:

Points and coordinates

The Point type holds two coordinates, x and y. For example:

julia> P = Point(12.0, 13.0)
Luxor.Point(12.0, 13.0)

julia> P.x
12.0

julia> P.y
13.0

Points are immutable, so you can't change P's x or y values directly. But it's easy to make new points based on existing ones.

Points can be added together:

julia> Q = Point(4, 5)
Luxor.Point(4.0, 5.0)

julia> P + Q
Luxor.Point(16.0, 18.0)

You can add and multiply Points and scalars:

julia> 10P
Luxor.Point(120.0, 130.0)

julia> P + 100
Luxor.Point(112.0, 113.0)

You can also make new points by mixing Points and tuples:

julia> P + (10, 0)
Luxor.Point(22.0, 13.0)

julia> Q * (0.5, 0.5)
Luxor.Point(2.0, 2.5)

You can also create points from tuples:

julia> Point((1.0, 14))
Point(1.0, 14.0)

julia> plist = (1.0, 2.0), (-10, 10), (14.2, 15.4));

julia> Point.(plist)
3-element Array{Point,1}:
 Point(1.0, 2.0)
 Point(-10.0, 10.0)
 Point(14.2, 15.4)

You can use the letter O as a shortcut to refer to the current Origin, Point(0, 0).

rulers()
box.([O + (i, 0) for i in range(0, stop=200, length=5)], 20, 20, :stroke)

Angles are usually supplied in radians, measured starting at the positive x-axis turning towards the positive y-axis (which usually points 'down' the page or canvas). So rotations are ‘clockwise’. (The main exception is for turtle graphics, which conventionally let you supply angles in degrees.)

Coordinates are interpreted as PostScript points, where a point is 1/72 of an inch.

Because Julia allows you to combine numbers and variables directly, you can supply units with dimensions and have them converted to points (assuming the current scale is 1:1):

• inch (in is unavailable, being used by for syntax)
• cm (centimeters)
• mm (millimeters)

For example:

rect(Point(20mm, 2cm), 5inch, (22/7)inch, :fill)

Drawings

Drawings and files

To create a drawing, and optionally specify the filename, type, and dimensions, use the Drawing constructor function.

Drawing(width=600, height=600, file="luxor-drawing.png")

Drawing()

Drawing(400, 300)

Drawing(400, 300, "my-drawing.pdf")

Drawing(1200, 800, "my-drawing.svg")

Drawing(width, height, surfacetype | filename)

Drawing(1200, 1200/Base.Mathconstants.golden, "my-drawing.eps")

Drawing("A4", "my-drawing.pdf")

Drawing("A4landscape")

Drawing(width, height, :image)

paper_sizes

"A0"      => (2384, 3370),
"A1"      => (1684, 2384),
"A2"      => (1191, 1684),
"A3"      => (842, 1191),
"A4"      => (595, 842),
"A5"      => (420, 595),
"A6"      => (298, 420),
"A"       => (612, 792),
"Letter"  => (612, 792),
"Legal"   => (612, 1008),
"Ledger"  => (792, 1224),
"B"       => (612, 1008),
"C"       => (1584, 1224),
"D"       => (2448, 1584),
"E"       => (3168, 2448))

To finish a drawing and close the file, use finish(), and, to launch an external application to view it, use preview().

If you're using a notebook environment, such as Jupyter (IJulia) or Pluto, preview() tries to display PNG and SVG files in the next notebook cell.

If you're using Juno or VS Code, then PNG and SVG files should appear in the Plots pane.

finish()

preview()

Quick drawings with macros

The @draw, @svg, @png, and @pdf macros are designed to let you quickly create graphics without having to provide the usual boiler-plate functions. For example, the Julia code:

@svg circle(Point(0, 0), 20, :stroke) 50 50

expands to

Drawing(50, 50, "luxor-drawing-(timestamp).svg")
origin()
background("white")
sethue("black")
circle(Point(0, 0), 20, :stroke)
finish()
preview()

They're short-cuts - designed to save a bit of typing. You can omit the width and height (defaulting to 600 by 600, except for @imagematrix), and you don't have to specify a filename (you'll get time-stamped files in the current working directory). For multiple lines, use either:

@svg begin
    setline(10)
    sethue("purple")
    circle(Point(0, 0), 20, :fill)
end

or (less nicely):

@svg (setline(10);
      sethue("purple");
      circle(Point(0, 0), 20, :fill)
     )

The @draw macro creates a drawing in-memory (not saved in a file). You should see it displayed if you're working in a suitable environment (Juno, VSCode, Jupyter, Pluto).

@svg drawing-instructions [width] [height] [filename]

@svg circle(O, 20, :fill)

@svg circle(O, 20, :fill) 400

@svg circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200

@svg circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200 "/tmp/test"

@svg circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200 "/tmp/test.svg"

@svg begin
        setline(10)
        sethue("purple")
        circle(O, 20, :fill)
     end

@svg begin
        setline(10)
        sethue("purple")
        circle(O, 20, :fill)
     end 1200 1200

@png drawing-instructions [width] [height] [filename]

@png circle(O, 20, :fill)

@png circle(O, 20, :fill) 400

@png circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200

@png circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200 "/tmp/round"

@png circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200 "/tmp/round.png"

@png begin
        setline(10)
        sethue("purple")
        circle(O, 20, :fill)
     end


@png begin
        setline(10)
        sethue("purple")
        circle(O, 20, :fill)
     end 1200 1200

@pdf drawing-instructions [width] [height] [filename]

@pdf circle(O, 20, :fill)

@pdf circle(O, 20, :fill) 400

@pdf circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200

@pdf circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200 "/tmp/A0-version"

@pdf circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200 "/tmp/A0-version.pdf"

@pdf begin
        setline(10)
        sethue("purple")
        circle(O, 20, :fill)
     end

@pdf begin
        setline(10)
        sethue("purple")
        circle(O, 20, :fill)
     end 1200 1200

@draw drawing-instructions [width] [height]

@draw circle(O, 20, :fill)

@draw circle(O, 20, :fill) 400

@draw circle(O, 20, :fill) 400 1200


@draw begin
         setline(10)
         sethue("purple")
         circle(O, 20, :fill)
      end


@draw begin
         setline(10)
         sethue("purple")
         circle(O, 20, :fill)
      end 1200 1200

If you don't specify a size, the defaults are 600 by 600. If you don't specify a file name, files created with the macros are placed in your current working directory as luxor-drawing- followed by a time stamp. You don't have to specify the suffix:

@svg juliacircles(150) 400 400 "test" # saves in "test.svg"

If you want to create drawings with transparent backgrounds, or use variables to specify filenames, use the longer form, rather than the macros:

Drawing()
background(1, 1, 1, 0)
origin()
setline(30)
sethue("green") # assumes current opacity
box(BoundingBox() - 50, :stroke)
finish()
preview()

Drawings in memory

You can choose to store the drawing in memory. The advantage is that in-memory drawings are quicker, and can be passed as Julia data. It's useful in some environments to not have to worry about writing files. This syntax for the Drawing() function:

Drawing(width, height, surfacetype, [filename])

lets you supply surfacetype as a symbol (:svg or :png). This creates a new drawing of the given surface type and stores the image only in memory if no filename is supplied. The @draw macro creates PNG files in memory.

You can specify :image as the surface type. This allows you to copy the current drawing into a 2D matrix (using image_as_matrix()). See the Images chapter for more information.

Interactive drawings

Using Pluto

Pluto notebooks typically display the final result of a piece of code in a cell. So there are various ways you can organize your drawing code. For example:

using Luxor, PlutoUI, Colors

@bind x Slider(0:0.1:12)

@bind y Slider(1:12)

@draw begin
	setopacity(0.8)
	for i in 0:0.1:1
		sethue(HSB(360i, .8, .8))
		squircle(O, 50, 50, :fill, rt = x * i)
		rotate(2π/y)
	end
end 100 100

or

begin
    d = Drawing(800, 800, :svg)
    origin()
	for (n, m) in enumerate(exp10.(range(0.0, 2, step=0.2)))
		setmesh(mesh(convert(Vector{Point}, BoundingBox()/m),
			["darkviolet","gold2", "firebrick2", "slateblue4"]))
    	rotate(π/7)
    	paint()
	end
    finish()
	d
end

Using Jupyter notebooks (IJulia and Interact)

Currently, you should use an in-memory SVG drawing to display graphics if you're using Interact.jl. This example provides an HSB color widget.

using Interact, Colors, Luxor
@manipulate for h in 0:360, s in 0:0.01:1, b in 0:0.01:1
    d = Drawing(300, 300, :svg)
    sethue(Colors.HSB(h, s, b))
    origin()
    circle(Point(0, 0), 100, :fill)  
    circle(polar(110, deg2rad(h)), 10, :fill)
    sethue("black")
    label(string(h, "°"), deg2rad(h), polar(120, deg2rad(h)))
        finish()
    d
end

The drawing surface

The origin (0/0) starts off at the top left: the x axis runs left to right across the page, and the y axis runs top to bottom down the page.

The origin() function moves the 0/0 point to the center of the drawing. It's often convenient to do this at the beginning of a program.

You can use functions like scale(), rotate(), and translate() to change the coordinate system.

background() fills the drawing with a color, covering any previous contents. By default, PDF drawings have a white background, whereas PNG drawings have no background so that the background appears transparent in other applications. If there is a current clipping region, background() fills just that region. In the next example, the first background() fills the entire drawing with magenta, but the calls in the loop fill only the active clipping region, a table cell defined by the Table iterator:

background("magenta")
origin()
table = Table(5, 5, 100, 50)
for (pos, n) in table
    box(pos,
        table.colwidths[table.currentcol],
        table.rowheights[table.currentrow],
        :clip)
    background(randomhue()...)
    clipreset()
end

The rulers() function draws a couple of rulers to indicate the position and orientation of the current axes.

background("gray80")
origin()
rulers()

background(color)

background("antiquewhite")
background(1, 0.0, 1.0)
background(1, 0.0, 1.0, .5)

background(RGB(0, 1, 0))
background(RGBA(0, 1, 0))
background(RGBA(0, 1, 0, .5))
background(Luv(20, -20, 30))

background(RGBA(0, 0, 0, 0))

background(0, 0, 0, 0)

rulers()

origin()

origin(pt:Point)

Save and restore

gsave() saves a copy of the current graphics settings (current axis rotation, position, scale, line and text settings, color, and so on). When the next grestore() is called, all changes you've made to the graphics settings will be discarded, and the previous settings are restored, so things return to how they were when you last used gsave(). gsave() and grestore() should always be balanced in pairs, enclosing the functions.

The @layer macro is a synonym for a gsave()...grestore() pair.

@svg begin
    circle(Point(0, 0), 100, :stroke)
    @layer (sethue("red"); rule(Point(0, 0)); rule(O, π/2))
    circle(Point(0, 0), 200, :stroke)
end

or

@svg begin
    circle(Point(0, 0), 100, :stroke)
    @layer begin
        sethue("red")
        rule(Point(0, 0))
        rule(Point(0, 0), pi/2)
    end
    circle(Point(0, 0), 200, :stroke)
end

gsave()

grestore()

Return the current drawing

In some situations you'll want to explicitly return the current drawing to the calling function.

currentdrawing()

Drawing as image matrix

While drawing, you can copy the current graphics in a drawing as a matrix of pixels, using the image_as_matrix() function.

image_as_matrix() returns a array of ARGB32 values. Each ARGB value encodes the Red, Green, Blue, and Alpha values of a pixel into a single 32 bit integer.

The following example draws a red rectangle, then copies the drawing into a matrix called mat1. Then it adds a blue triangle, and copies the updated drawing into mat2. In the second drawing, values from the two matrices are tested, and table cells are randomly colored depending on the corresponding values ... this is a primitive Boolean operation.

Drawing(40, 40, :png)
origin()
background("black")
sethue("red")
box(Point(0, 0), 40, 15, :fill)
mat1 = image_as_matrix()
sethue("blue")
setline(10)
setopacity(0.6)
ngon(Point(0, 0), 10, 3, 0, :stroke)
mat2 = image_as_matrix()
finish()

# second drawing

Drawing(400, 400, "assets/figures/image-drawings.svg")
background("grey20")
origin()
t = Table(40, 40, 4, 4)
sethue("white")
rc = CartesianIndices(mat1)
for i in rc
    r, c = Tuple(i)
    pixel1 = convert(Colors.RGBA, mat1[r, c])
    pixel2 = convert(Colors.RGBA, mat2[r, c])
    if red(pixel1) > .5 && blue(pixel2) > .5
        randomhue()
        box(t, r, c, :fillstroke)
    end
end

The first image (enlarged) shows the mat1 matrix as red, mat2 as blue.

In the second drawing, a table with 1600 squares is colored according to the values in the matrices.

(You can use collect() to gather the re-interpreted values together.)

You can display the matrix using, for example, Images.jl.

using Luxor, Images

# in Luxor

Drawing(250, 250, :png)
origin()
background(randomhue()...)
sethue("red")
fontsize(200)
fontface("Georgia")
text("42", halign=:center, valign=:middle)
mat = image_as_matrix()
finish()

# in Images

img = RGB.(mat)
# img = Gray.(mat) # for greyscale

imfilter(img, Kernel.gaussian(10))

In Luxor:

In Images:

@imagematrix(body, width=256, height=256)

m = @imagematrix begin
        sethue("red")
        box(O, 20, 20, :fill)
    end 60 60

julia>  m[1220:1224] |> show
    ARGB32[ARGB32(0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8),
           ARGB32(1.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,1.0N0f8),
           ARGB32(1.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,1.0N0f8),
           ARGB32(1.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,1.0N0f8),
           ARGB32(1.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,0.0N0f8,1.0N0f8)]

m = @imagematrix begin
        sethue("red")
        box(O, 20, 20, :fill)
        sethue("blue")
        box(O, 10, 40, :fill)
    end 60 60

function convertmatrixtocolors(m)
    return convert.(Colors.RGBA, m)
end

function drawimagematrix(m)
    d = Drawing(500, 500, "/tmp/temp.png")
    origin()
    w, h = size(m)
    t = Tiler(500, 500, w, h)
    mi = convertmatrixtocolors(m)
    @show mi[30, 30]
    for (pos, n) in t
        c = mi[t.currentrow, t.currentcol]
        setcolor(c)
        box(pos, t.tilewidth -1, t.tileheight - 1, :fill)
    end
    finish()
    return d
end

drawimagematrix(m)

julia> @imagematrix begin
       end 2 2
2×2 reinterpret(ARGB32, ::Array{UInt32,2}):
 ARGB32(0.0,0.0,0.0,0.0)  ARGB32(0.0,0.0,0.0,0.0)
 ARGB32(0.0,0.0,0.0,0.0)  ARGB32(0.0,0.0,0.0,0.0)

julia> @imagematrix begin
       background(1, 0.5, 0.0, 0.5) # semi-transparent orange
       end 2 2
2×2 reinterpret(ARGB32, ::Array{UInt32,2}):
 ARGB32(0.502,0.251,0.0,0.502)  ARGB32(0.502,0.251,0.0,0.502)
 ARGB32(0.502,0.251,0.0,0.502)  ARGB32(0.502,0.251,0.0,0.502)

julia> @imagematrix begin
           sethue(1., 0.5, 0.0)
       paint()
       end 2 2
2×2 reinterpret(ARGB32, ::Array{UInt32,2}):
 ARGB32(1.0,0.502,0.0,1.0)  ARGB32(1.0,0.502,0.0,1.0)
 ARGB32(1.0,0.502,0.0,1.0)  ARGB32(1.0,0.502,0.0,1.0)

@imagematrix!(buffer, body, width=256, height=256)

w = 200
h  = 150
buffer = zeros(UInt32, w, h)
m = @imagematrix! buffer juliacircles(40) 200 150;
Images.RGB.(m)

image_as_matrix()

using Luxor, Images

Drawing(50, 50, :png)
origin()
background(randomhue()...)
sethue("white")
fontsize(40)
fontface("Georgia")
text("42", halign=:center, valign=:middle)
mat = image_as_matrix()
finish()

image_as_matrix!(buffer)

w = 200
h = 150
buffer = zeros(UInt32, w, h)
Drawing(w, h, :image)
origin()
juliacircles(50)
m = image_as_matrix!(buffer)
finish()
# collect(m)) is Array{ARGB32,2}
Images.RGB.(m)