Author: Wayne Oldford and Zehao Xu
Date: 2026-04-04

# Adding glyphs on scatterplot

#### Wayne Oldford and Zehao Xu

#### 2026-04-04

Glyphs can be used as point symbols in a scatterplot to convey more information on each point. This information could range from providing a more evocative picture for each point (e.g., an airplane for flight data or a team’s logo for sports data) to incorporating quantitative information (e.g., the values of other variables in a serial axes or star glyph or as a Chernoff face).

In `ggmulti` we provide “glyph” layers to help add this information as point symbols on a plot (Waddell and Oldford 2020).

## Polygon glyphs

Consider, for example, the lower 48 USA destinations of “nyc” flights in 2013. Each destination could be marked as a “airplane” polygon symbol and New York city is highlighted by a blue star.

    library(ggmulti)
    library(nycflights13)
    library(maps)

    # Flight destinations
    destinations <- nycflights13::airports %>%
      dplyr::rename(dest = faa) %>%
      dplyr::semi_join(nycflights13::flights, by = "dest") %>%
      dplyr::mutate(tzone = gsub("America/", "", tzone)) %>%
      dplyr::filter(lon > -151,
                    lat < 55)

    # New York City coordinates
    NY <- data.frame(
      lon = -73.935242,
      lat = 40.730610
    )
    US <- map_data("state")  %>%
      ggplot(aes(long, lat)) +
      geom_polygon(mapping = aes(group = group),
                   color="black", fill="cornsilk")
    NYflightDestinationMap <- US +
      geom_polygon_glyph(data = destinations,
                         mapping = aes(x = lon, y = lat),
                         fill = "pink",
                         # negate x to have each plane face west
                         polygon_x = -x_airplane,
                         polygon_y = y_airplane,
                         alpha = 0.75) +
      geom_polygon_glyph(data = NY,
                         mapping = aes(x = lon, y = lat),
                         polygon_x = x_star,
                         polygon_y = y_star,
                         alpha = 0.75,
                         fill = "blue")
    NYflightDestinationMap

Package “ggmulti” provides several polygon coordinates that can be used in `geom_polygon_glyph`, check `help("polygon_glyph", "ggmulti")`.

## Image glyphs

We can also load image files (png, jpeg, etc) and set each image as a point glyph. Let’s draw a chart of two 2020 Final NBA Teams.

    library(png)
    img_path <- list.files(file.path(find.package(package = 'ggmulti'),
                                     "images"),
                           full.names = TRUE)
    Raptors <- png::readPNG(img_path[grepl("Raptors", img_path)])
    Warriors <- png::readPNG(img_path[grepl("Warriors", img_path)])

    # Golden State Coordinate
    GoldenState <- data.frame(
      lon = -119.4179,
      lat = 36.7783
    )

    Toronto <- data.frame(
      lon = -79.3832,
      lat = 43.6532
    )

    # Get the Canada lakes
    cdn.lakes <-  maps::map("lakes",
                            plot=FALSE,
                            fill=TRUE)$names[c(7,8,27,22, 25,
                                               68:73, 82, 85
                            )]

    US +
      geom_polygon(
        data = maps::map("world",  "Canada", fill=TRUE, plot=FALSE),
        mapping = aes(long, lat, group = group),
        fill="#ffcccb", colour = "black"
      ) +
      geom_polygon(
        # lakes in Canada
        data =  maps::map("lakes", cdn.lakes, plot=FALSE, fill=TRUE),
        mapping = aes(long, lat, group = group),
        fill="lightblue", colour = "black"
      ) +
      geom_image_glyph(data = GoldenState,
                       mapping = aes(x = lon, y = lat),
                       images = Warriors,
                       imagewidth = 1,
                       imageheight = 1,
                       colour = NA) +
      geom_image_glyph(data = Toronto,
                       mapping = aes(x = lon, y = lat),
                       imagewidth = 1,
                       imageheight = 1,
                       colour = NA,
                       images = Raptors) +
      ggtitle("2019 NBA Finals")

## Serialaxes glyphs

Additionally, ‘serial axes’ can also be drawn as glyphs.

    ggplot(iris) +
      geom_serialaxes_glyph(
        mapping = aes(Sepal.Length, Sepal.Width, colour = Species),
         # set serial axes data set (could be different from the original data)
        serialaxes.data = iris,
        # parallel or radial axes
        axes.layout = "radial",
         # sequence of serial axes
        axes.sequence = colnames(iris)[-5]
      )

In this figure, we can tell the specie ‘setosa’ lays on the left top corner and the glyph shape is like a triangle that is very distinguishable from the rest two species.

## Reference

Waddell, Adrian, and R. Wayne Oldford. 2020. Loon: Interactive Statistical Data Visualization. http://great-northern-diver.github.io/loon/.