Scientific visuals are more than just eye candy—they shape understanding, communicate key insights, and often form the basis of publications and presentations. Yet for many molecular modelers, generating consistent, clear, and meaningful representations of complex structures can be a time-consuming process. Coloring chains differently, tweaking representations for different types of atoms or molecules, and applying labels or zoom actions often involves clicking through numerous menus. Wouldn’t it be nice to do all that in just a click?
Enter Visual Presets in SAMSON. These are ready-to-apply templates that instantly transform your molecular system using pre-configured visual models, selections, color schemes, and more—without having to manually set each one.
Why Visual Presets Matter
Whether you’re analyzing a protein-ligand complex or visualizing a solvent environment, clarity matters. Visual presets allow you to:
- Apply consistent styling across molecules and documents
- Share standardized visual representations with colleagues
- Quickly switch between views optimized for different tasks (e.g., binding site inspection vs. whole-structure overview)
- Save time by avoiding repetitive manual styling
How to Apply a Visual Preset
Applying a preset is straightforward:
Go to Home > Visual preset or Visualization > Visual preset and simply choose from the list.
Here’s an example of what the Protein-Ligand preset looks like when applied to PDB structure 1AA1:
Presets are applied either to selected nodes or to the entire document if nothing is selected. A folder is automatically created in the document to organize the visual models and selections.
Saving Time with Customized Presets
The real power of visual presets lies in customization. By using the Visual Preset Editor, you can tailor your presets to display exactly what you need, how you need it.
Each preset consists of steps, and each step lets you specify:
- What kind of selection it applies to (e.g., ligand, receptor, all atoms)
- Actions such as labeling or zooming
- The type of visual representation (e.g., ribbons, van der Waals spheres)
- The color scheme or palette
This modular approach makes it easy to build polished, consistent visualizations for common scenarios or even publication figures.
You can start from existing presets and edit them, or build your own from scratch by clicking the plus (+) button in the Visual Preset Editor.
Reproducibility and Collaboration
Because presets are saved and automatically loaded each time you use SAMSON, it becomes effortless to maintain a consistent visual language across projects. Sharing visuals with collaborators? Just send them your preset file. Everyone works from the same view, and the discussions can focus on science, not style.
To learn more about Visual Presets and how to create your own, check the full documentation at https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/visual-presets/
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can get SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net