making grids of plots in units that make sense

gridspec_inches.py

def gridspec_inches(
    wcols,
    hrows,
    fig_kwargs={}):

    import matplotlib as mpl
    import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

    fig_height_inches = (
        sum(hrows)
        )

    fig_width_inches = (
        sum(wcols)
        )

    fig=plt.figure(
        figsize=(fig_width_inches,fig_height_inches),
        subplotpars=mpl.figure.SubplotParams(
        left=0,
        right=1,
        bottom=0,
        top=1,
        wspace =0,
        hspace = 0.0),
        frameon=False,
        **fig_kwargs)
    fig.set_size_inches(fig_width_inches,fig_height_inches,forward=True)

    gs = mpl.gridspec.GridSpec(
        len(hrows),
        len(wcols),
        left=0,
        right=1,
        top=1,
        bottom=0,
        wspace=0,
        hspace=0,
        width_ratios=wcols,
        height_ratios=hrows
        )

    return fig, gs