matplotlib - Python show image upon hovering over a point

Question

I have a 2-d scatter plot of points, that correspond to images. I was wondering if there's an easy way to display the corresponding image (as a popup or tooltip) when you hover your mouse over each point? I tried plotly but found out you need to manually edit javascript to get the hover event to work. Is there a simple solution just with matplotlib or some other common package?

Answer 1

Find here a complete solution on how to display an image on hover events. It uses a 'motion_notify_event' to detect when the mouse is over a scatter point (hovering). If this is the case, it displays an image annotation with a corresponding image next to the hovered scatter point.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from matplotlib.offsetbox import OffsetImage, AnnotationBbox
import numpy as np; np.random.seed(42)

# Generate data x, y for scatter and an array of images.
x = np.arange(20)
y = np.random.rand(len(x))
arr = np.empty((len(x),10,10))
for i in range(len(x)):
    f = np.random.rand(5,5)
    arr[i, 0:5,0:5] = f
    arr[i, 5:,0:5] =np.flipud(f)
    arr[i, 5:,5:] =np.fliplr(np.flipud(f))
    arr[i, 0:5:,5:] = np.fliplr(f)

# create figure and plot scatter
fig = plt.figure()
ax = fig.add_subplot(111)
line, = ax.plot(x,y, ls="", marker="o")

# create the annotations box
im = OffsetImage(arr[0,:,:], zoom=5)
xybox=(50., 50.)
ab = AnnotationBbox(im, (0,0), xybox=xybox, xycoords='data',
        boxcoords="offset points",  pad=0.3,  arrowprops=dict(arrowstyle="->"))
# add it to the axes and make it invisible
ax.add_artist(ab)
ab.set_visible(False)

def hover(event):
    # if the mouse is over the scatter points
    if line.contains(event)[0]:
        # find out the index within the array from the event
        ind, = line.contains(event)[1]["ind"]
        # get the figure size
        w,h = fig.get_size_inches()*fig.dpi
        ws = (event.x > w/2.)*-1 + (event.x <= w/2.) 
        hs = (event.y > h/2.)*-1 + (event.y <= h/2.)
        # if event occurs in the top or right quadrant of the figure,
        # change the annotation box position relative to mouse.
        ab.xybox = (xybox[0]*ws, xybox[1]*hs)
        # make annotation box visible
        ab.set_visible(True)
        # place it at the position of the hovered scatter point
        ab.xy =(x[ind], y[ind])
        # set the image corresponding to that point
        im.set_data(arr[ind,:,:])
    else:
        #if the mouse is not over a scatter point
        ab.set_visible(False)
    fig.canvas.draw_idle()

# add callback for mouse moves
fig.canvas.mpl_connect('motion_notify_event', hover)           
plt.show()