Time Series plots with custom breaks and colors

customcolors.R

#by Christopher DeSante#
#Load ggplot2 #
library(ggplot2)
 ### X-axis: ###
anes.years <- c(1988, 1990, 1992, 1994, 2000, 2004, 2008,2016)

## Some DVs ##

mum1<-rnorm(8, 8,1)
mum2<-rnorm(8, 8,1)
mum3<-rnorm(8, 8,1)
mum4<-rnorm(8, 8,1)

#Combine into single vector: #
q.means <- c(mum1, mum2, mum3, mum4)

## Add text labels for four Questions ##
q.labels <- c(rep("Question 1...", 8),
rep("Question 2...", 8),
rep("Question 3...", 8),
rep("Question 4...", 8))


#Specify custom colours#
my.colors <- c(rep("darkred", 8), rep("purple4", 8),
rep( "darkgreen", 8), rep("steelblue4",8))

 #begin plot command
qplot(anes.years,
q.means,
colour=my.colors,
geom="linerange",
ymin=0, ymax=q.means,
 size=I(9),
 ylim=c(0,20)
 , xlab="\n \n Year",     #\n adds break
 ylab="Mean response \n"

) + facet_wrap(~q.labels) +
scale_x_continuous(limits=c(1988, 2016),  breaks=anes.years) + # custom X ticks

scale_colour_identity()  +  # use custom colours
theme_bw( )   +           # get rid of default grey background
opts(legend.position="none")    +  # hide legend
opts(axis.text.x = theme_text(angle = 45, hjust = 1,  #customize X axis text
face="bold", colour= "black", size=12)  ) +

opts(strip.text.x = theme_text(colour= "black",      #customize Question Label text
size=16))