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Overview

Selecting this menu item pops up a window that allows you to edit color tables or set a color table for pseudocolor and surface plots.

Color table window

The Color table window should look like Color table window , if you are using MeshTV's defaults. If you aren't, the values might be different.

If you don't see a description for an item in this window, check in the Shared items section near the front of the chapter.

This window allows you to select different color tables for pseudocolor and surface plots and edit new or existing color tables. You can even import color tables that conform to MeshTV's color table format. MeshTV supports color tables in the NCSA PAL binary format, which consists of 256 sets of 3 bytes. Each respective byte in the trio represents red, green, and blue for each of the 256 colors. MeshTV does not require the NCSA header at the beginning of the file.

Color table manager

This area consists of controls that let you select, create, delete, save, and reset color tables.

Color table selection option

The Color table selection option menu allows you to select different color tables for pseudocolor and surface plots. There are seven standard color tables and a user-defined menu that contains user-defined and external color tables, which allows you to select your own color table. When no color tables have been saved in the user menu, it is disabled until user-defined or external color tables are added.

Cale black option

This color table mimics the color table used by the computer code, Cale, but the lowest level color is black. This allows low values to fade into the background when you're running with a black background in the visualization window.

Cale white option

This color table mimics the color table used by the computer code, Cale. This allows low values to fade into the background when you're running with a white background in the visualization window.

Contoured option

This color table provides four colors with a sharp transition to show course-grained changes in values.

Gray scale option

This color table ranges in color from black to white, in shades of gray. It can be useful to use this to check for features which might be difficult to see when using a color table with widely varying colors.

Hot to cold option

This color table ranges in color from blue to red, with blue being "cold," and red being "hot."

Rainbow option

This color table presents colors as they appear in a rainbow.

X-ray option

This color table ranges in values from white to black, in shades of gray. It can be used to simulate what a radiograph of the problem might look like.

User option

When you select this color table option, you are selecting a user-defined color table. The user-defined color table was either created with the color table editor or was read from an external file. If the color table was read from an external file, it must conform to MeshTV's color table format. MeshTV supports color tables in the NCSA PAL binary format, which consists of 256 sets of 3 bytes where each respective byte in the trio represents red, green, and blue for each of the 256 colors. MeshTV does not require the NCSA header at the beginning of the file.

File name text field

This text field allows you to enter a path to your own color table, enter the name of a new color table, or enter a filename to which the active color table will be saved. If you want to import your own color table from a file, type the path and name of the color table into this text field and press the Enter or Return key on your keyboard. Doing so will load the specified color table into the color table window and add it to the color table window's user-defined color table menu. If you want to enter the name of a new color table, simply type a new name into the text field and press the New button . If you want to save the currently active color table to a file, type a filename into the text field and press the Save to file button .

New button

This button allows you to create a new color table. To create a new color table, first type a new color table name into the File name text field and click the New button. If the color table name already exists, an information message will tell you to enter a different color table name. After a new name has been entered and the New button has been clicked, a copy of the currently active color table is made and given the new name. The new color table is added to the user-defined color table menu and can be modified as needed. The New button is disabled if the active color table was imported from a color table file since color table files do not contain the information necessary to edit a color table.

Delete button

This button allows you to delete a user-defined color table from the user-defined color table menu. When a user-defined color table is deleted, its name is removed from the user-defined color table menu and the active color table is set to "Hot to cold". If the currently active color table is one if the seven MeshTV standard color tables, the Delete button is disabled.

Save to file button

This button allows you to save the currently active color table to an external color table file. To save the currently active color table to an external color table file, type the desired filename in the File name text field and press the Save to file button .

MeshTV default button

This button restores a MeshTV standard color table to its default values. If the currently active color table is a user-defined color table, this button is disabled.

Color table editor

This area contains the controls necessary to edit a color table.

Color spectrum

All user-defined color tables are now defined in terms of a set of color control points. The color spectrum displays the color and location of these control points relative to one another. This allows the user to edit a color table by changing color control points. A color table always has at least two color control points, which are shown in above figure as pointy boxes above the color spectrum. The color control points can only be edited one at a time and the color control point must be selected before it can be changed. The currently selected color control point is shown on the very left and has a small mark below its color box. To select a new color control point, simply click on one using the pointer.

Since the position of the color control points helps to determine the look of the color table displayed in the color spectrum, color control points can also be moved. To move a color control point, drag it to the desired location with the left pointer button. You can also click on an area where no color control point exists. This will move the selected control point closer to where the pointer was clicked.

Color tables that have been read from external color table files will not have color control points. This type of color table cannot be edited with the color spectrum.

Add color button

This button, drawn with a "+" character, inserts a new color control point into the color spectrum to the right of the selected color control point. The newly inserted color control point then becomes the selected color control point.

Remove color button

This button, drawn with a "-" character, removes the selected color control point. A different color control point is then selected.

Align button

This button replaces the position information of all of the color control points in order to make them equally spaced.

Equal spacing toggle button

This toggle button makes the color spectrum ignore the position information of the color control points and makes them equally spaced. When the button is not toggled, the position information is again taken into account.

Smooth toggle button

This toggle button turns color interpolation between control points on and off.

Color value scroll bar

The color value scroll bars indicate the color of the selected color control point. The color of the selected color control point can be changed by moving the scroll bars. There is a scroll bar for the red color channel, the green color channel, and the blue color channel.

Color value text field

The color text fields indicate the color of the selected control point as numbers from 0 to 255. The color of the selected color control point can be changed by typing new values into the color text fields. There is a text field for the red color channel, the green color channel, and the blue color channel