OOF: Finite Element Analysis of Microstructures

Color Dashboard next up previous contents
Next: Element Info Dashboard Up: The Dashboards Previous: Attributes Dashboard   Contents


Color Dashboard

Figure 5.3: Anatomy of the Color Dashboard.
% a clumsy but documented latex2html hack
7810

The Color Dashboard (Figure 5.3) controls the color scheme used to display stresses and strains in the various Stress and Strain Drawers. Because the form of the Color Dashboard is identical, no matter what's being displayed, in this section we'll call the displayed quantity stress to avoid excess, extraneous, and superfluous verbiage.

The bar on the left side is the color bar; it displays all of the colors used in the image.

The maximum and minimum values of stress in the grid are printed in the region labeled image limits in Figure 5.3. These values correspond to the range of colors displayed in the Drawer if the Full Scale check box is highlighted. If Full Scale is not highlighted, then the limit boxes at the ends of the color bar indicate the values of stress corresponding to the colors at the ends of the bar. These limits can be changed by typing new values into the limit boxes. (Make sure to hit $\langle$return$\rangle$ after typing a new value, or it won't take effect.) The limit boxes do not appear if Full Scale is on.

The color scheme determines how values of stress are converted into colors. The name of the current color scheme is shown in the Scheme Selector. Use the left mouse button on the Scheme Selector to bring up a menu of available color schemes, or use the middle and right buttons to cycle through the schemes. The number of colors used in the scheme can be set by typing in the Size box. A large number of colors (say 100) will give smooth gradations, but smaller numbers (10 or 20) can be useful for visualizing stress contours. On machines with 8-bit graphics, attempting to use too many colors is a mistake. The Flip button inverts the color scheme.

The Color Dashboard includes a primitive way of editing the colors in the current color scheme. This can be handy if you'd like to highlight a particular value of stress in the image. Clicking on a color in the color bar with the right mouse button will print the color and the stress range that it represents in the Message Window. Clicking with the left mouse button brings up a Color Browser (Figure 5.4) which allows the color to be changed. Clicking on the color bar with the middle mouse button makes the chosen color revert to its default value in the current color scheme. Note that the changes in the color scheme are lost if you change Drawers!

Figure 5.4: Anatomy of the Color Browser. The original color is the color that's being changed. Clicking on the OK button changes the original color to the new color, and clicking on the Nope button closes the window without changing the color. The new color is set by clicking and dragging the mouse on the red, green and blue sliders. The numbers above the sliders display their current values, in the range 0 to 255. If the sliders don't give you fine enough control, it's because they are less than 255 pixels long. Resizing the window should help.
% a clumsy but documented latex2html hack
7819


next up previous contents
Next: Element Info Dashboard Up: The Dashboards Previous: Attributes Dashboard   Contents
/* Send mail to the OOF Team *//* Go to the OOF Home Page */