How can I save a figure in a .fig file as an image with higher dpi?

Question

I have a figure file (.fig) that I want to save as a 900 dpi TIFF file.

Normally, if I create the plot myself:

figure;
plot(x,y);

Then the command:

print(gcf,'test.tif','-dpng','-r900');

Would produce the image I want. However, I only have the .fig file and MATLAB does not recognize that plot window by the keyword gcf. Is there any way to save a high resolution image from a .fig file?

Answer 1

The function gcf simply returns the current figure handle, so if you've recreated the figure by opening your .fig file with openfig, it should work. The following example creates two identical TIFF files at a resolution of 900 dpi, one before saving a .fig and one after loading the .fig:

surf(peaks);           % Create a surface plot
print(gcf, 'before_save.tif', '-dpng', '-r900');  % Save figure as an image
savefig('peaks.fig');  % Save figure in a .fig file
close(gcf);            % Close figure

openfig('peaks.fig');  % Recreate figure from .fig file
print(gcf, 'after_save.tif', '-dpng', '-r900');  % Save new figure as an image