# MATLAB: Setting ‘FaceAlpha’<1 for a patch object causes x- and y- axes of the plot to dissapear. Why and how can this be corrected

plottingvisualization

Hello everyone,
have any of you ever plotted a 2D patch object and noticed that upon altering its 'FaceAlpha' value below 1, it causes the x- and y-axes of the plot to disappear? Just to clarify, by x- and y- axes I mean the horizontal and vertical lines of the plot, respectively, not the axes object where the patch is plotted.
Here is an example of what I talking about:
% Plot a simple patch objectx=[0 1 1 0 0];y=[0 0 1 1 0];figure('color','w')ha1=subplot(1,2,1);ha2=subplot(1,2,2)h=fill(x,y,'g');% DO the same as above, but alter the FaceAlpha value of the patchfigure('color','w')ha1=subplot(1,2,1);ha2=subplot(1,2,2);h=fill(x,y,'g');set(h,'FaceAlpha',0.5)
Note that changing the transparency of the patch in the second figure caused the x- and y- axes (i.e., horizontal and vertical lines) to disappear in ha1 and ha2.
Does anyone know why this happens, and how can it be corrected?
Thank you!
PS – Not sure if its relevant, but I am using R2013a version of Matlab.

% Plot a simple patch objectx=[0 1 1 0];y=[0 0 1 1];hfig1 = figure('color','w');ha1=subplot(1,2,1);ha2=subplot(1,2,2);hfill1 = fill(x,y,'g');hfig2 = figure('color','w');ha3=subplot(1,2,1);ha4=subplot(1,2,2);hpatchobj = patch(x,y,'g','FaceAlpha',0.5);set(ha3,'LineWidth',1.5);