Place the figure title as its own paragraph below the diagram, not within the diagram. This convention should also be used for web-based publications.
Number figures consecutively within the document (eg Figure 1, Figure 2, Figure 3), or by section or chapter (eg Figure 2.1, Figure 2.2, Figure 4.1, Figure B5). Numbering by section is useful because changes in one section will not affect figure numbering in another section. This is especially important in long documents or those that have many figures.
Use a title that describes the diagram content, including the period that the data cover, if appropriate:
Figure 3 Timeline of the arrival of selected feral animals in Australia from 1750 to 1950
Use minimal capitalisation (only capitalise the first letter of the first word of the title and proper nouns).
Use minimal punctuation to keep figure titles clean and uncluttered: follow figure numbers with a tab, not a colon, and do not place a full stop at the end. Using a tab also helps align the names properly in an automatically generated contents list of figures.
Spell out abbreviations in full in the title, wherever possible. Put any necessary detail in explanatory figure notes. The title should not cover more than 2 lines (preferably 1 line).
For a series of diagrams, give the same information in the same order.
