Zooming narrow image should fill axes

Hello,

When using imshow to display an narrow image in symmetric axes, zooming in maintains the same aspect ratio, resulting in a very narrow view of the image. The desired behavior is for the image to fill the entire axes at high zoom so more details are visible. Is there any way to alter the zoom behavior to achieve this effect?

Here is some example code that reproduces the problem:

figure; axes('Position',[0.1 0.1 0.8 0.8]);
RGB = imread('peppers.png');
strip = RGB(150:180,:,:);
imshow(strip);

Thank you for your help

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

Instead of using imshow(), use image() with "axis equal".

Some of prominent volunteers think highly of imshow(), but in my experience it has too many side effects for anything other than casual interactive viewing.

[Daniel Terry]

Thank you, this has resolved the issue. I wasn't aware of image() or the limitations of imshow().

[DGM]

This. MIMT imshow2() was my workaround for the terrible viewport handling and cumbersome controls (and for the fact that imshow() used to require IPT). It fills the available area a bit better than using the 'axes equal' trick does, even with axes position set to [0 0 1 1].

Of course, it's hard to recommend after R2018a, since it doesn't play nice if the user tries to also use the view controls in the floating axes toolbar. I still think the new view controls are clumsier than what akZoom() offers, so the change doesn't really bother me. Maybe I should get around to fixing it again.