[Tex/LaTex] compare two diagrams side by side

graphicssubcaptionsubfloats

I'm trying to compare two diagrams in pdf format side by side.
I have this post – Two figures side by side to get some hint.

This is the code that I'm coming up with.

\begin{figure}
\begin{minipage}[t]{0.45\linewidth}
\includegraphics[scale=0.30]{before.pdf}
\caption{(a) Before}
\end{minipage}%

\hfill\vrule\hfill
\begin{minipage}[t]{0.45\linewidth}
\includegraphics[scale=0.3]{after.pdf}
\caption{(b) After}
\end{minipage}%
\caption{Hello}
\end{figure}

And this is the result, which is not exactly what I expected.

enter image description here

What modifications are needed to make the pictures sit side by side?
I just want the caption (a) Before and (b) After without any Figure prepended. What should I do?

Best Answer

Although you can solve perfectly the problem with minipages, for sub-figures with captions enumerated with letters (a,b,..) you can use also the package subcaption to simplify a little your code, as you do not need write "(a)" and "(b)", but mainly because the flexibility that you have with this package, as listing the subfigures. Note that neither is it necessary in the MWE the use of \centering nor include file extension (.pdf).

Note: Remove the demo option in graphicx package to use your diagrams instead of the black boxes:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[demo]{graphicx} % remove option for real images
\usepackage[list=true]{subcaption}

\begin{document}
\listoffigures    
\vspace{3cm}

\begin{figure}[h]%

\begin{subfigure}[h]{0.4\textwidth}
\includegraphics[width=\textwidth]{before}
\caption{Before}
\end{subfigure}
\hfill\vrule\hfill
\begin{subfigure}[h]{0.4\textwidth}
\includegraphics[width=\textwidth]{after}
\caption{After}
\end{subfigure}%

\caption[Hello]{Hello, this a minimal working example}
\end{figure}
\end{document}

enter image description here

Alternatively you can use also subfig or subfigure packages for the same reasons. See Setting default distance between subfigures for examples with these packages.

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] How to put two tables in a table* element so that the tables appear side by side in a two column layout scientific paper

You should use the subfig package.

\begin{table*}
\subfloat[First caption]{\begin{tabular}{...}...\end{tabular}}
\subfloat[Second caption]{\begin{tabular}{...}...\end{tabular}}
\caption{Overall caption}
\end{table*}

This can be used in conjunction with the floatrow package. See the subfig documentation for an example that aligns captions using floatrow.

EDIT:
Your example has an extra \begin{table} that doesn't belong. It also has a blank line which causes TeX to start a new paragraph which is why one table appears on top of the other.

Here's a complete example where I've also cleaned up your tables following the guidelines given in the documentation to the booktabs package.

\documentclass[twocolumn]{article}
\usepackage{subfig}
\usepackage{booktabs}
\begin{document}
\begin{table*}
\subfloat[Before processing]{
\begin{tabular}{ccccc}
\toprule
Year & Month & Country & State & Impressions\\
\midrule
2007 & JAN & IN & TN & 3\\
2007 & JAN & IN & TN & 1\\
\bottomrule 
\end{tabular}
}%
\hfill
\subfloat[After processing]{
\begin{tabular}{ccccc}
\toprule 
Year & Month & Country & State & Impressions\\
\midrule 
2007 & JAN & IN & TN & 7\\
2007 & FEB & IN & KA & 13\\
\bottomrule 
\end{tabular}
}
\caption{overall}
\end{table*}
\end{document}

[Tex/LaTex] Two diagrams side by side

As @egreg said in the comments, the reason why the second figure is below is due to the blank line.

There is a very good reason for this. Recall that in text mode a blank line signals the beginning of a new paragraph and subsequent text is placed below. So, the following will place the words next to each other:

One
Two

but the following will place the words below each other:

One

Two

Same goes for pictures, there are just boxes as far as TeX is concerned, not much different from letters, words, paragraphs, etc....

The MWE below produces the image on the left, but if you insert a blank line you get the image on the right:

enter image description here

Note:

My rule of thumb is not to use blank lines unless I am trying to indicate a new paragraph. For readability you can insert a comment line as long as the first non-blank character is a %. Note that it does not need to be at the beginning of the line as in the MWE below.

Code:

Since this problem is not related to feynmf, I simply used pgfplots to generate the figures:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{pgfplots}
\usepackage{subfig}

\begin{document}
\begin{figure}[ht!]
    \centering
    \subfloat{
        \begin{tikzpicture}
        \begin{axis}[height=3cm]
        \end{axis}
        \end{tikzpicture}
    }
    % A blank line here like a new paragraph so next picture is placed below
    \subfloat{
        \begin{tikzpicture}
        \begin{axis}[height=3cm]
        \end{axis}
        \end{tikzpicture}
    }

    \caption{Exchange two subfloats}
    \end{figure}
\end{document}

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] How to put two tables in a table* element so that the tables appear side by side in a two column layout scientific paper

[Tex/LaTex] Two diagrams side by side

Note:

Code:

Related Question