change font in plotrix' multhist

Question

Suppose that data is

library(plotrix)
set.seed(42)
a <- rnorm(100)
b <- rnorm(100) + 1

and I would like to plot these using multhist()from plotrix and use Palatino font (or any other serif font). Unfortunately,

multhist(list(a,b), family="Palatino")

yields a standard plot with a sans serif font. Is there a trick to change fonts in multhist()?

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 11 '20 at 21:56

Plotrix calls the default barplot parameters and to change the fonts there, you need to use par. For MacOS, it should be as described in this post

Not very good with fonts, hope this is correct:

par(mfrow=c(1,3))
par(family ="sans")
multhist(list(a,b),main="sans")

quartzFonts(palatino = c("Palatino Regular","Palatino Italic",
"Palatino Bold","Palatino Bold Italic"))
par(family ="Palatino")
multhist(list(a,b),main="Palatino")

quartzFonts(avenir = c("Avenir Book", "Avenir Black", 
"Avenir Book Oblique", "Avenir Black Oblique"))
par(family ="avenir")
multhist(list(a,b),main="avenir")

So you need to open a new device and do:

quartzFonts(palatino = c("Palatino Regular","Palatino Italic",
    "Palatino Bold","Palatino Bold Italic"))
    par(family ="Palatino")
    multhist(list(a,b),main="Palatino")

Excellent, thanks! All I needed to do was add `par(family="Palatino")` to my `pdf(...)` device. — bumblebee, Apr 11 '20 at 22:17
you're welcome :) glad it's helpful. i can never tell fonts apart from one another — StupidWolf, Apr 11 '20 at 22:23

change font in plotrix' multhist

1 Answers1