Visualize Properties

create_material(..., enable_plotting=True) writes a composite PNG of every property while it builds. That is great for a one-shot overview, but it always saves to disk and you cannot restyle it. For interactive work - a Jupyter notebook, a custom figure, comparing materials - use the post-build helpers in materforge.visualization.plots (re-exported from the top-level materforge).

Each helper draws onto a Matplotlib Axes (a fresh one, or the ax= you pass) and returns it without saving or closing - so a notebook cell renders it inline and you keep full control of styling and output.

Plot a Property With Its Data

import sympy as sp
import materforge as mf

T = sp.Symbol('T')
mat = mf.create_material('steel.yaml', dependency=T, enable_plotting=False)

ax = mf.plot_property(mat, 'heat_capacity')   # fitted curve + the source points

The curve is sampled from the compiled property over the source-data range; show_data=False hides the scatter, and dep_range=(lower, upper) overrides the range (required for a property that kept no source data, such as a constant or a piecewise-equation).

Plot Residuals

ax = mf.plot_residuals(mat, 'heat_capacity')  # predicted - observed, with a zero line

A flat band near zero means a good fit; structure (a trend or fanning) points to too few segments or too low a regression degree.

Compare Materials

ax = mf.compare_materials([steel, alloy], 'density', labels=['1.4301', 'myAlloy'])

Overlays the same property from several materials on one axis - useful for comparing two materials, or the same material built with different regression settings. labels default to each material’s name.

Compose Your Own Figure

Because every helper takes ax= and returns it, you can lay out exactly what you want and decide if and where to save:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

fig, (top, bottom) = plt.subplots(2, 1, sharex=True, figsize=(7, 6))
mf.plot_property(mat, 'heat_capacity', ax=top)
mf.plot_residuals(mat, 'heat_capacity', ax=bottom)
fig.savefig('heat_capacity_fit.png', dpi=300)   # only if you want to

Next Steps