How to create and plot polygons in python using shapely and matplotlib ?

Introduction

In this article, we will explore how to plot polygons in python using shapely library. Shapely is a python package for computational geometry which provides easy access to geometric objects such as points, lines, and polygons. Using shapely, we can create and manipulate geometric objects in python and visualize them using various plotting tools.

Before jumping into the details of plotting polygons with shapely, let's first understand some basic concepts. In geometry, a polygon is a closed shape formed by connecting points together with straight lines. It can have three or more sides and each point where two line segments meet is called a vertex. Some common examples of polygons are triangles, squares, rectangles, and pentagons. Polygons can be simple or complex depending on the number of sides and vertices they have. In python, we can represent polygons using coordinates of their vertices.

Create and plot a square using python

To create a polygon in Shapely, we need to provide a list of coordinates representing the exterior ring of the polygon.

Creating a square

Let's create a simple square with coordinates (0, 0), (0, a), (a, a), and (a, 0) using Shapely:

from shapely.geometry import Polygon

import numpy as np

a = 2.0 # square size

pos = np.array((1.0, 2.0))

c1 = np.array((0.0, 0.0)) + pos
c2 = np.array((0.0, a)) + pos
c3 = np.array((a, a)) + pos
c4 = np.array((a, 0.0)) + pos

coords = (c1,c2,c3,c4)

square = Polygon( coords )

Please note that once you have created a polygon using shapely, you can easily retrieve the coordinates.

To retrieve the coordinates for a polygon created using shapely, you can use the exterior.coords method. This will return a list of tuples representing the coordinates of each vertex in the polygon. You can then use these coordinates to plot your polygon on a graph or map.

X,Y = square.exterior.coords.xy

print(np.array(X))
print(np.array(Y))

the code above will return:

[1. 1. 3. 3. 1.]
[2. 4. 4. 2. 2.]

Note that we can the stack X and Y in a 2D array of dimension (5,1)

np.stack( (X, Y), axis=1 )

returns

array([[1., 2.],
       [1., 4.],
       [3., 4.],
       [3., 2.],
       [1., 2.]])

Plotting a square

from matplotlib.pyplot import figure

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import matplotlib.patches as mpatches

fig = figure(num=None, figsize=(12, 10), dpi=100, edgecolor='k')

ax = plt.axes()

poly = mpatches.Polygon(np.stack( (X, Y), axis=1 ), 
                        closed=True, 
                        ec='k', 
                        lw=1, 
                        color='coral',
                        alpha=0.5)

ax.add_patch(poly)

plt.xlim(0,6)
plt.ylim(0,6)

plt.title('How to create and plot a square in python using shapely and matplotlib ?')

plt.savefig("shapely_square.png", bbox_inches='tight', facecolor='white')

plt.show()

Another example

from matplotlib.pyplot import figure

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import matplotlib.patches as mpatches

fig = figure(num=None, figsize=(12, 10), dpi=100, edgecolor='k')

ax = plt.axes()

poly = mpatches.Polygon(np.stack( (X, Y), axis=1 ), 
                        closed=True, 
                        ec='k', 
                        lw=1, 
                        color='coral',
                        alpha=0.5)

ax.add_patch(poly)

ax.grid(True)
ax.spines['left'].set_position('zero')
ax.spines['right'].set_color('none')
ax.spines['bottom'].set_position('zero')
ax.spines['top'].set_color('none')

plt.xlim(-6,6)
plt.ylim(-6,6)

plt.title('How to create and plot a square in python using shapely and matplotlib ?')

plt.savefig("shapely_square_02.png", bbox_inches='tight', facecolor='white')

plt.show()

Create and plot a rectangle using python

To create a rectangle, we need to provide the coordinates of its four corners. In Shapely, polygons are defined using tuples of (x,y) coordinates. Let's define our coordinates:

Creating a rectangle

from shapely.geometry import Polygon

import numpy as np

a = 2.0 # rectangle size
b = 4.0 # rectangle size

pos = np.array((1.0, 2.0))

c1 = np.array((0.0, 0.0)) + pos
c2 = np.array((0.0, a)) + pos
c3 = np.array((b, a)) + pos
c4 = np.array((b, 0.0)) + pos

coords = (c1,c2,c3,c4)

rect = Polygon( coords )

rect.exterior.coords.xy

X,Y = rect.exterior.coords.xy

Plotting a rectangle

from matplotlib.pyplot import figure

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import matplotlib.patches as mpatches

fig = figure(num=None, figsize=(12, 10), dpi=100, edgecolor='k')

ax = plt.axes()

poly = mpatches.Polygon(np.stack( (X, Y), axis=1 ), 
                        closed=True, 
                        ec='k', 
                        lw=1, 
                        color='coral',
                        alpha=0.5)

ax.add_patch(poly)

plt.xlim(0,6)
plt.ylim(0,6)

plt.title('How to create and plot a rectangle in python using shapely and matplotlib ?')

plt.savefig("shapely_rectangle.png", bbox_inches='tight', facecolor='white')

plt.show()

Create and plot a triangle using python

To create a triangle, we need to provide the coordinates of its four corners. In Shapely, polygons are defined using tuples of (x,y) coordinates. Let's define our coordinates:

Creating a triangle

from shapely.geometry import Polygon

import numpy as np

a = 2.0 # rectangle size
b = 4.0 # rectangle size

pos = np.array((1.0, 2.0))

c1 = np.array((0.0, 0.0)) + pos
c2 = np.array((0.0, a)) + pos
c3 = np.array((b, a)) + pos
c4 = np.array((b, 0.0)) + pos

coords = (c1,c2,c3,c4)

triangle = Polygon( coords )

triangle.exterior.coords.xy

X,Y = triangle.exterior.coords.xy

Plotting a triangle

from matplotlib.pyplot import figure

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import matplotlib.patches as mpatches

fig = figure(num=None, figsize=(12, 10), dpi=100, edgecolor='k')

ax = plt.axes()

poly = mpatches.Polygon(np.stack( (X, Y), axis=1 ), 
                        closed=True, 
                        ec='k', 
                        lw=1, 
                        color='coral',
                        alpha=0.5)

ax.add_patch(poly)

plt.xlim(0,6)
plt.ylim(0,6)

plt.title('How to create and plot a triangle in python using shapely and matplotlib ?')

plt.savefig("shapely_triangle.png", bbox_inches='tight', facecolor='white')

plt.show()

References