[yt-dev] Default colormap

Thu Jan 21 10:12:26 PST 2016

I like middle. (and this is not based on who's it is -- but you shouldn't
have told us the names)

Btw, this reminds me that I saw a very nice talk at the AAPT meeting by a
UCSC graduate (Zoe ... last name escapes me).  She did studies on using
movies in teaching (and used a lot of Joel Primack's stuff), and worked
with a range of students, and one of the conclusions is that students
understood simulations of dark matter a lot better when the dark matter was
colored dark instead of in bright colors.  Seems obvious, in hindsight, but
most of the movies you see online use bright colors / whites for high dark
matter density.  Her talk was very interesting, and it is nice to see
someone thinking about how the color choices we make in movies affects how
people learn from them.

On Thu, Jan 21, 2016 at 1:06 PM, Matthew Turk <matthewturk at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi folks,
>
> I've put up a comparison image:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/Afxdb0G.jpg
>
> Left is Kacper, middle is me, right is Nathan.
>
> Honestly I think all could go in, but we should pick a default -- whether
> it's one of these or a different one.  Anyone have a strong opinion?
>
> -Matt
>
> On Mon, Jan 18, 2016 at 10:19 AM, B.W. Keller <kellerbw at mcmaster.ca>
> wrote:
>
>> Wow, all of these look great.  I think I like Matt's best for painting
>> our bikeshed, but I would be happy with any of them.
>>
>> On Mon, Jan 18, 2016 at 11:10 AM, Kacper Kowalik <xarthisius.kk at gmail.com
>> > wrote:
>>
>>> On 01/18/2016 09:45 AM, Matthew Turk wrote:
>>> > Hi all,
>>> >
>>> > I've experimented a bit and come up with this:
>>> >
>>> > https://images.hub.yt/u/fido/m/9bbe3cf6-png/
>>> >
>>> > The script:
>>> >
>>> > http://paste.yt-project.org/show/6151/
>>> >
>>> > This was designed with the viscm project, which is awfully cool.  What
>>> > do folks think?  I think Kacper and Nathan also experimented with
>>> > viscm and have some ideas too, so maybe we should put it up for an
>>> > eventual vote.
>>>
>>> This is my experiment:
>>>
>>> https://images.hub.yt/u/fido/m/f180a901-png/
>>>
>>> Source:
>>>
>>> http://paste.yt-project.org/show/6166/
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Kacper
>>>
>>>
>>> >
>>> > Also, I would campaign for calling whatever our new colormap turns out
>>> > to be one of these three things, in increasing order of my preference:
>>> >
>>> > agar
>>> > kelp
>>> > kanten
>>> >
>>> > -Matt
>>> >
>>> > On Thu, Jan 14, 2016 at 10:57 AM, Matthew Turk <matthewturk at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> >> Hi Stuart and everyone else,
>>> >>
>>> >> This is great info.  I appreciate everyone's thoughtful replies.
>>> >>
>>> >> Having both a sequential colormap (which would replace algae) and a
>>> >> diverging colormap, would be awesome.  The Paraview devs shipped the
>>> >> new matplotlib ones (like Inferno) in 5.0.  I think it would be a fun
>>> >> experiment to see if we can come up with something sufficiently
>>> >> "branded" or different.  And then if we can't, fall back on something
>>> >> like Inferno?
>>> >>
>>> >> -Matt
>>> >>
>>> >> On Wed, Jan 6, 2016 at 12:48 PM, Levy, Stuart A <salevy at illinois.edu>
>>> wrote:
>>> >>> There was a fair bit of discussion about colormaps - terrible,
>>> useful,
>>> >>> beautiful - at IEEE Vis last October.   The viridis colormap was a
>>> featured
>>> >>> one.   So was the traditional rainbow, which lots of info-vis and
>>> perceptual
>>> >>> people piled on to criticize.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Among design criteria for a continuous-valued colormap is whether
>>> it's
>>> >>> "sequential" (like the typical yt colormap, or viridis) or
>>> "diverging".
>>> >>> You'd want a diverging colormap to show signed deviations from a
>>> norm -
>>> >>> where the eye should be caught by places where a value is either
>>> much less
>>> >>> than, or much more than, something in the middle.   Is it worth
>>> offering a
>>> >>> typical divergent colormap, as well as a new typical sequential one,
>>> in yt?
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Note that among the Stefan van der Walt & Nathaniel Smith writeup (
>>> >>> http://bids.github.io/colormap/ ) on their development of better
>>> cmaps, they
>>> >>> use Nathan Goldbaum's galaxy evolution as a test case for six
>>> (sequential)
>>> >>> examples! =>
>>> http://vorpus.org/~njs/goldbaum-galaxies-all-colormaps.mkv
>>> >>>
>>> >>> A neat web site with sample colormaps - aimed at mapping discrete
>>> values on
>>> >>> geographic maps, so not directly applicable but cool - is this, by
>>> Cynthia
>>> >>> Brewer and Mark Harrower at PSU:
>>> >>>     http://colorbrewer2.org/
>>> >>> It has a library of predesigned cmaps, and lets you sift them by
>>> being
>>> >>> colorblind-safe, photocopy safe, etc.
>>> >>> ________________________________
>>> >>> From: yt-dev [yt-dev-bounces at lists.spacepope.org] on behalf of B.W.
>>> Keller
>>> >>> [kellerbw at mcmaster.ca]
>>> >>> Sent: Wednesday, January 06, 2016 12:13
>>> >>> To: yt-dev at lists.spacepope.org
>>> >>> Subject: Re: [yt-dev] Default colormap
>>> >>>
>>> >>> There is a really excellent paper on designing color maps called
>>> "Color
>>> >>> Sequences for Univariate Maps: Theory, Experiments, and Principles"
>>> that you
>>> >>> can get here:
>>> >>>
>>> http://ccom.unh.edu/sites/default/files/publications/Ware_1988_CGA_Color_sequences_univariate_maps.pdf
>>> >>>
>>> >>> If we design a new colormap, this would be a good reference along
>>> with those
>>> >>> scipy resources.  I personally would love to have an accessible,
>>> yt-custom
>>> >>> colormap.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> On Wed, Jan 6, 2016 at 11:50 AM, Erik Schnetter <schnetter at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> I think there are several colourmaps that were created when Viridis
>>> >>>> was invented. I personally like Inferno.
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> -erik
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> On Wed, Jan 6, 2016 at 11:34 AM, Nathan Goldbaum <
>>> nathan12343 at gmail.com>
>>> >>>> wrote:
>>> >>>>> I would also be for coming up with our own colormap. That said, I
>>> think
>>> >>>>> simply modifying algae won't be enough, since it is too
>>> perceptually
>>> >>>>> nonlinear.
>>> >>>>>
>>> >>>>> On Wed, Jan 6, 2016 at 10:32 AM, John ZuHone <jzuhone at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> >>>>>>
>>> >>>>>> I would go for modifying algae.
>>> >>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> On Jan 6, 2016, at 11:30 AM, Matthew Turk <matthewturk at gmail.com
>>> >
>>> >>>>>>> wrote:
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> Hi folks,
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> For a long time we've used "algae," which was designed by Britton
>>> >>>>>>> about eight years ago, as the default colormap.  This has been
>>> really
>>> >>>>>>> nice for "branding" yt -- if you see an algae plot, it's probably
>>> >>>>>>> (not
>>> >>>>>>> definitely) made with yt.  But it's also not accessible from a
>>> >>>>>>> colorblindness perspective.  Stefan van der Walt has been giving
>>> some
>>> >>>>>>> really great talks lately about building a better colormap for
>>> >>>>>>> matplotlib (e.g., https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAoljeRJ3lU )
>>> which
>>> >>>>>>> culminated in viridis, which is shipping in recent versions of
>>> >>>>>>> matplotlib and will become the default.
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> In support of this, he built a tool called viscm which can
>>> generate
>>> >>>>>>> reduced versions of colormaps to show what they would be like
>>> with
>>> >>>>>>> varying degrees of insensitivity to color.  I've generated
>>> outputs
>>> >>>>>>> from viscm of three of the custom colormaps we ship with yt:
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> Algae: https://images.hub.yt/u/fido/m/d275d5e1-png/
>>> >>>>>>> Cubehelix: https://images.hub.yt/u/fido/m/8e698928-png/ (I
>>> believe
>>> >>>>>>> this is now also shipped with MPL)
>>> >>>>>>> Kamae: https://images.hub.yt/u/fido/m/e0e40efa-png/
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> I love algae, but it's not the best from an accessibility
>>> >>>>>>> perspective.
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> I'd like to propose that we use a new default colormap.  If we do
>>> >>>>>>> this, I see two options:
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> * Retain a "branding" by developing a new one either by using the
>>> >>>>>>> techniques used by matplotlib (or one of the maps they opted not
>>> to
>>> >>>>>>> use) or by modifying algae to be more accessible; looking at the
>>> >>>>>>> response functions, I suspect it would be reasonably possible to
>>> >>>>>>> modify it.  (Modifying algae is my preference.)
>>> >>>>>>> * Use viridis (which we may then have to ship if we have older
>>> >>>>>>> versions of matplotlib to support)
>>> >>>>>>>
>>> >>>>>>> -Matt
>>> >>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>> >>>>>>> yt-dev mailing list
>>> >>>>>>> yt-dev at lists.spacepope.org
>>> >>>>>>> http://lists.spacepope.org/listinfo.cgi/yt-dev-spacepope.org
>>> >>>>>>
>>> >>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> >>>>>
>>> >>>>>
>>> >>>>>
>>> >>>>> _______________________________________________
>>> >>>>> yt-dev mailing list
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>>> >>>>>
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> --
>>> >>>> Erik Schnetter <schnetter at gmail.com>
>>> >>>> http://www.perimeterinstitute.ca/personal/eschnetter/
>>> >>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
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-- 
Michael Zingale
Associate Professor

Dept. of Physics & Astronomy • Stony Brook University • Stony Brook, NY
11794-3800
*phone*:  631-632-8225
*e-mail*: Michael.Zingale at stonybrook.edu
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