Diamond Version 5 User Manual: Display of structure picture

Background

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Diamond uses two different modes concerning the background of the structure picture:

1. Normal mode can use any background color. This color is usually dark and used to represent a structure picture on the screen. (The default background color is black.)

2. Black-on-white mode ignores the background color but uses white in any case. This is usually used to represent a structure picture for printouts.

Background Color

Any color can be defined for the background, but this color will be ignored, if black-on-white mode is active.

To edit the background color, choose the Layout command from the Display menu, which opens the Layout dialog. On the Background page, push the Background color button. This opens the MS Windows standard color dialog, where you can select a pre-defined color or define a new color by specifying RGB (red, green, blue) or HSL (hue, saturation, lightness) values. After you have selected or defined the color, you must push the OK or Apply Now button in the Layout dialog to take the new color into affect.

Black-on-White Mode

In black-on-white mode, the background color is ignored and the background will be painted white instead (on the screen) or remains white (on printout). The "Automatic" color will become black, while it is white in normal mode.

To activate black-on-white mode, choose the Layout command from the Display menu, which opens the Layout dialog. On the Background page, check the Use black-on-white mode for drawing on screen... checkbox.

Even if black-on-white mode is not active, black-on-white mode can be used for printout. (This is the default setting for Diamond.) To disable black-on-white mode for printout, clear the checkbox Use black on white mode for printing. To produce a printout with background color, both black-on-white settings must be disabled.

Both page view (page layout) and print preview use the same setting as for the printout, which means that the background is white by default in these modes.

Transparent background

If you would like to import your structure picture e.g. into a graphics program without the background, you typically have to define some color to be taken as transparent color. This color should only be present in the background and not in any other part of the structural model itself.

If you have activated the Transparent option (checkbox checked), Diamond will replace the background color automatically by some appropriate color when exporting the structure picture.

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Next article: Lighting