Creating visually clear and publication-ready molecular images can be a time-consuming process. Many molecular modelers struggle to find a balance between scientific accuracy and aesthetic quality. Flat-looking models can obscure important structural details or make figures harder to interpret, especially when trying to distinguish between different molecular components.
But there's a straightforward way to improve this: by using material presets in the integrated Cycles renderer in SAMSON. This doesn't just enhance your molecular images—it can also help highlight properties or categories in an intuitive, visual way.
Ready-to-use materials, no setup required
The Cycles renderer in SAMSON gives access to a wide palette of ready-to-use material presets, from realistic metals like gold and copper, to transparent materials like ice or glass, and emissive glowing materials. These appearances can be applied in just a few clicks through the Inspector.
Benefits of using materials:
- Enhance the separation of molecular elements visually
- Support visual storytelling where certain atoms or groups should stand out
- Generate consistency across presentations or publications
This example shows the difference materials can make:
You can switch materials easily using the Appearance preset menu in the Inspector. You’ll find several categories, including:
- Metallic: Gold, Silver, Steel, etc.
- Semi-metallic: Brass, Bronze
- Smooth: Ceramic, Latex, Plastic
- Rough: Velvet, Concrete, Wood
- Emissive: Soft glow to intense shine
- Transparent: Glass, Water, Jade
Here you can see the material preset panel in action:
Customizing materials
Beyond presets, SAMSON lets you tweak specific material parameters. You can fine-tune roughness, transparency, reflectivity, and more. This is useful when visualizing subtle differences, e.g., comparing ligands that bind differently due to electronic structure or environmental effects.
An example below shows how varied appearances can be used to visually separate ligand components:
Using materials effectively
Here are a few suggestions to get the most out of material presets in SAMSON:
- Use transparent materials (like ice or glass) on solvent-accessible surfaces to emphasize the core structure
- Try emissive materials to highlight active sites (very useful in presentations)
- Use rough materials (e.g., velvet or granite) to de-emphasize background elements or structural supports
Whether you’re preparing a journal figure or just exploring a complex structure, well-chosen render materials offer a powerful way to communicate structure and function across disciplines.
To learn more about Cycles and materials in SAMSON, visit the full documentation page: https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/rendering/
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.