MATLAB: How to create a color bar to correspond to the jet color scheme

Question

I've used the jet function to create a gradient of color, such that every color is a different voltage. How do I make a color bar given the RGB array I made with the jet function and assign the max and min voltage values on the color bar for my figure? Thanks!

Answer 1

Try this:

Plot some data:

surf(peaks)

Change the colormap*:

colormap(jet) 

Add a colorbar and put a label on it:

cb = colorbar; 
ylabel(cb,'voltage') 

Set colorbar limits:

caxis([-8 4]) 

That'll create this figure:

* But note, there are some perceptual issues with using jet to represent numbers. For those reason's the jet colormap has fallen out of fashion in recent years. Read up on #endrainbow if you're curious to know more.