Crop to floats with Preview but skip caption?

Question

I would like my 'figure' environments to be exported tightly cropped. If I use this:

\usepackage[floats,active,tightpage]{preview}

the caption is included. If I use this (of course, with real \includegraphics commands instead of these filler boxes):

\usepackage[graphics,active,tightpage]{preview}

each subfigure is exported separately so I lose the arrangement/connection of the subfigures.

1) Is there a way to get this float composed of subfig's to be tightly cropped excluding the caption?

2) Is there a way to get it to crop the figures horizontally as well? The vertical cropping seems to work (if I omit the caption command), but the output is always the pagewidth.

\documentclass[10pt]{article}

\usepackage[floats,active,tightpage]{preview}

\usepackage{graphicx}

\usepackage[caption=false,format=hang]{subfig}

\begin{document}

\def\FigSize{.23}
\begin{figure}[htbp!]
\subfloat[]
  {
  \fbox{\rule{0pt}{2in} \rule{\FigSize \linewidth}{0pt}}
  }
\subfloat[]
  {
  \fbox{\rule{0pt}{2in} \rule{\FigSize \linewidth}{0pt}}
  }
\caption{Test Caption}
\end{figure}

\end{document}

I tried putting the subfigures in a minipage, but it seems to put A directly ontop of B? And it still has not cropped the result horizontally?

\documentclass[preview]{standalone}
\usepackage{mwe}
\usepackage{subcaption}

\begin{document}

\def\FigSize{.33}
\begin{figure}
\begin{minipage}{2\FigSize \linewidth}
  \begin{subfigure}[b]{\FigSize \textwidth}
  \centering
    \includegraphics[width=\FigSize \textwidth]{example-image-a}
  \phantomcaption
  \end{subfigure}
  \begin{subfigure}[b]{\FigSize \textwidth}
  \centering
    \includegraphics[width=\FigSize \textwidth]{example-image-b}
  \phantomcaption
  \end{subfigure}
\end{minipage}
\end{figure}

\end{document}

Answer 1

You can use the standalone class and subcaption package for the same use.

\documentclass[preview]{standalone}
\usepackage{mwe} %<- For dummy images replace with graphicx later
\usepackage{subcaption}

\begin{document}
\begin{figure}
\begin{subfigure}[b]{.333\textwidth}
\centering
  \includegraphics[width=3cm]{example-image-a}
\phantomcaption
\end{subfigure}%
\begin{subfigure}[b]{.333\textwidth}
\centering
  \includegraphics[width=3cm]{example-image-b}
\phantomcaption
\end{subfigure}%
\begin{subfigure}[b]{.333\textwidth}
\centering
  \includegraphics[width=3cm]{example-image-c}
\phantomcaption
\end{subfigure}%

\end{figure}
\end{document}