Visual Settings & Camera
Control the global scene, camera, lighting, effects, image quality, and presentation style.
Use Display to style individual molecular components. Use Settings, the top-bar controls, and camera gestures to control the complete scene. Keeping these scopes separate makes visual changes more predictable.
Global settings versus component settings
| You want to change | Use |
|---|---|
| Protein or ligand representation, color, visibility, or opacity | Display |
| Background, lighting, effects, projection, or anti-aliasing | Settings |
| Quick background color | BG in the top bar |
| Complete coordinated visual treatment | Style in the top bar |
| Camera framing | Fit and viewport navigation |
Camera navigation
| Goal | Control |
|---|---|
| Rotate | Left-drag |
| Zoom | Scroll |
| Pan | Middle-drag |
| Focus a picked atom | Double-click |
| Focus the complete scene | Fit → All (reset) |
| Focus the ligand | Fit → Ligand |
| Select | Click |
| Add or remove from selection | Ctrl/Cmd+click |
| Open contextual actions | Right-click |
Use Fit → All (reset) as the recovery action whenever the structure is lost, clipped, or framed too closely.
Choose a projection
| Projection | Best for | Tradeoff |
|---|---|---|
| Perspective | Natural depth and presentation views | Apparent size changes with distance |
| Orthographic | Structural comparison and technical figures | Depth feels flatter |
Use the same projection and a saved camera when comparing two scenes. Otherwise, camera changes can look like structural differences.
Background
Choose a solid, horizontal-gradient, or radial-gradient background in Settings. The top-bar BG swatches provide fast solid-color options.
- Dark backgrounds work well for interactive review and bright molecular colors.
- White backgrounds integrate easily into many documents and figures.
- Transparent backgrounds are selected at image export time, not by making the viewport transparent.
Lighting and exposure
Lighting controls include ambient intensity, direct-light intensity, inclination, azimuth, and exposure. Adjust them as a coordinated set:
Effects
| Effect | Adds | Use carefully when |
|---|---|---|
| Outline | Stronger silhouettes and separation | Dense atomic scenes can become visually busy |
| Ambient Occlusion | Contact shadows and depth cues | Dark pockets may lose detail |
| Shadows | Directional depth | Scientific detail must remain visible |
| Depth of Field | Focus separation | The full structure needs to remain interpretable |
| Bloom | Glow around bright features | Bright atom colors can lose precision |
| Fog | Atmospheric depth | Distant components still matter |
| Sharpening | Stronger local edge contrast | Thin lines or labels may become harsh |
Effects should support structure reading, not compensate for a weak component hierarchy.
Anti-aliasing and field of view
- Choose SMAA or FXAA when smoother edges improve the scene; use Off only for diagnostic or performance reasons.
- Adjust field of view only when using perspective projection and the default framing does not suit the scene.
- Recheck labels, interaction lines, and thin bonds after changing image-quality settings.
Style presets
The top-bar Style menu applies a coordinated starting point.
| Preset | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Default | Balanced general review |
| Publication | Clean figure-oriented scene |
| Publication (solvent) | Publication styling while retaining solvent context |
| Illustrative | Diagram-like structural communication |
| Pretty | Polished presentation view |
| Binding Site | Ligand and nearby-residue focus |
| Binding Site (dry) | Binding-site focus without water clutter |
Apply a preset early, then refine components and camera. Applying another preset later may replace several coordinated visual choices.
Before applying a new Style preset to a carefully prepared scene, save the viewer session or create a story scene. A preset is a multi-setting change, not a single color adjustment.