Presenting molecular systems clearly and beautifully is a constant task for molecular scientists and modelers. But manually configuring colors, styles, and rendering effects for every scene can take time—especially during presentations, teaching, or when sharing data with collaborators. If you’ve ever felt like you’re spending more time adjusting visuals than analyzing your structures, there’s a faster way: visual presets in SAMSON.
Visual presets are predefined combinations of visual representations and color schemes that can be applied to molecular systems with just a few clicks. They allow quick switching between complete visualization setups and help standardize how complex structures are shown, making your workflow more efficient and consistent.
What Are Visual Presets?
In SAMSON, a visual preset can include visual models (like ribbons or van der Waals), color schemes (per chain or element), and rendering styles (shadows, lighting, fog, etc.). Applying one instantly transforms the view of your system—without the need to go through each setting manually.
Where to Find Them
To use visual presets in SAMSON, go to:
Visualization > Visual preset
There you will find a list of default presets, including ones tailored for different types of biological assemblies or illustrative styles. For example:
- Protein-ligand: Highlights important features of receptor-ligand systems.
- Illustrate…: Mimics the soft stylized appearance of PDB’s Molecule of the Month.
Below is an example of the “Protein-ligand” visual preset applied to the protein 1AA1:
Creating Custom Visual Presets
If you’re often applying the same color scheme and representation types to your molecules, you can save even more time by creating your own visual preset:
- Apply your desired visual model and rendering settings to a molecule.
- Then go to Visualization > Visual preset > Save current as preset.
You can then reuse this preset on other systems, making your workflow more reproducible.
Tweaking the Look Further
Presets don’t lock you in. After applying a preset, you can still modify transparency, hide parts of the structure, change rendering options like fog or shadows, or apply additional visual models on top. Everything is still under your control.
Ideal for Rapid Prototyping and Teaching
If you’re preparing teaching materials or scientific presentations, visual presets offer a reliable foundation you can build upon. The “Illustrate…” preset, for example, is great when you want that familiar hand-drawn style reminiscent of educational molecular art.
Here’s that Visual Preset in action again:
Final Thoughts
Visual presets are more than a convenience—they’re a practical solution to one of the recurring challenges in molecular modeling: presenting clear, high-quality visuals quickly. Whether you’re sharing insights with peers or preparing data for publication, using presets can streamline your process and elevate your presentation standards.
To learn more about using visual presets, how to customize them, and explore additional visualization techniques, visit the full documentation here:
https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/visualizing/
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.