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Created December 6, 2012 05:42
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Documenting the matplotlib colormaps
Raw
colormaps()_docstring.rst

matplotlib provides the following colormaps.

  • autumn
  • bone
  • cool
  • copper
  • flag
  • gray
  • hot
  • hsv
  • jet
  • pink
  • prism
  • spring
  • summer
  • winter
  • spectral

You can set the colormap for an image, pcolor, scatter, etc, either as a keyword argument:

imshow(X, cmap=cm.hot)

or post-hoc using the corresponding pylab interface function:

imshow(X)
hot()
jet()

In interactive mode, this will update the colormap allowing you to see which one works best for your data.

Raw
full list.txt
From cm._cmapnames
Copied from MATLAB:
autumn
bone
cool
copper
flag
gray
hot
hsv
jet
pink
prism
spring
summer
winter
(Not copied from MATLAB: colorcube, lines, white)
These were all added here https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib/commit/26ffb47e95d7d694a94bb101d17ebcd0622d15f7
Copied from GIST/Yorick:
descriptions here http://dhmunro.github.com/yorick-doc/manual/yorick_70.html
These palettes tend to start with dark colors and progress toward lighter colors, except yarg and rainbow
gist_earth "is loosely based on mapmaker's colors from dark blue deep ocean to green lowlands to brown highlands to white mountains"
gist_gray (identical to gray)
gist_heat "a red-orange scale resembling the colors of an iron bar as it grows hotter"
gist_ncar
gist_rainbow "runs through the colors in spectral order at nearly constant intensity"
gist_stern
gist_yarg (identical to gray_r and binary)
sources here: https://github.com/dhmunro/yorick/tree/master/g
no explanation of what ncar or stern are for
spectral (Spectral is not the same!)
"Tim Leslie's spectral patch"
Only non-MATLAB colormap to have a post-hoc function
Looks similar but not exactly same as:
http://www.math.mcgill.ca/keith/surfstat/doc/SurfStat/spectral.html
http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/4706-mia-2-4/content/mia24/Tools/spectralmni.m
"black-purple-blue-green-yellow-red-white"
cubehelix
Unlike most other color schemes cubehelix was designed by D.A. Green to
be monotonically increasing in terms of perceived brightness.
Also, when printed on a black and white postscript printer, the scheme
results in a greyscale with monotonically increasing brightness.
This color scheme is named cubehelix because the r,g,b values produced
can be visualised as a squashed helix around the diagonal in the
r,g,b color cube.
discussion http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/message.php?msg_id=28065739
paper http://arxiv.org/abs/1108.5083
see cm.cubehelix() (no way to view the docstring?)
coolwarm
Discussion about patch:
http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/message.php?msg_id=27816391
– The map yields images that are aesthetically pleasing.
– The map has a maximal perceptual resolution.
– Interference with the shading of 3D surfaces is minimal.
– The map is not sensitive to vision deficiencies.
– The order of the colors should be intuitively the same for all people.
– The perceptual interpolation matches the underlying scalars of the map.
http://www.cs.unm.edu/~kmorel/documents/ColorMaps/index.html
ColorBrewer
Added here https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib/commit/31c07815140e97becf2f2e037b8a214e263290b2
Accent
Blues
BrBG
BuGn
BuPu
Dark2
GnBu
Greens
Greys
Oranges
OrRd
Paired
Pastel1
Pastel2
PiYG
PRGn
PuBu
PuBuGn
PuOr
PuRd
Purples
RdBu
RdGy
RdPu
RdYlBu
RdYlGn
Reds
Set1
Set2
Set3
Spectral (spectral is not the same!)
YlGn
YlGnBu
YlOrBr
YlOrRd
misc others added at the same time
afmhot
brg
bwr
gnuplot
gnuplot2
ocean
rainbow
seismic
terrain
all added here: http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/message.php?msg_id=23330302
seismic from here? http://soliton.vm.bytemark.co.uk/pub/cpt-city/gery/index.html
afmhot, ocean, rainbow from here? http://gnuplot.sourceforge.net/docs_4.2/node216.html
binary
identical to gray_r and gist_yarg
added here: https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib/commit/47af03d985d9729f3eedc41354fe11a22eff35c4
meant for barcodes?
identify which are isoluminant/monotonic, sequential/diverging, etc
Raw
h5utils definitions.rst

From http://ab-initio.mit.edu/wiki/index.php/Color_tables_in_h5topng

autumn
red-orange-yellow color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
bluered
blue-white-red colorbar, useful for signed data in conjunction with -Z option to make white=0
bone
nearly grayscale (blackish to whitish) color map with a tinge of blue; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab, which suggests using it to add an "electronic" look to grayscale images
colorcube
enhanced color-cube color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab, basically designed to fill the RGB color space with an emphasis on a few pure colors
cool
cyan-magenta color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
copper
black-copper color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
dkbluered
dark blue-white-red colorbar, useful for signed data in conjunction with -Z option to make white=0; similar to bluered but shows a bit more dynamic range for the maxima/minima by darkening at the ends
flag
alternating red/white/blue/black color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
gray
simple black-to-white grayscale color bar
green
white-green color map; useful for translucent overlays with -A
hot
black-red-yellow-white color map, useful for nonnegative "intensity" data — based on colormap of the same name in Matlab, loosely resembling the color of heated object at increasing temperatures
hsv
red-yellow-green-cyan-blue-pink-magenta color map formed by changing the hue component in the HSV color space; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab, who recommend it for used in plotting periodic data (that is, in which the maximum magnitude and the minimum magnitude are equivalent)
jet
blue-cyan-yellow-red color map (a variant of hsv; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab, who based it on a fluid-jet simulation by NCSA
lines
oscillating color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab (based on the Matlab plot-line colors)
pink
pastel black-pink-white color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab, used for Sepia tone colorization
prism
repeating red-yellow-green-blue-purple-...-green color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
spring
magenta-yellow color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
summer
green-yellow color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
vga
Windows 4-bit color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
winter
blue-green color map; based on colormap of the same name in Matlab
yarg
simple white-to-black grayscale color bar (the reverse of gray, and almost equivalent to using -gray or gray with -r); this is useful to make contour-like overlays with the -A option because its transparency scale (black is transparent) is the opposite of gray (white is transparent)
yellow
white-yellow color map; useful for translucent overlays with -A
Raw
MATLABs definitions.rst

From http://www.mathworks.com/help/techdoc/ref/colormap.html

autumn
varies smoothly from red, through orange, to yellow.
bone
is a grayscale colormap with a higher value for the blue component. This colormap is useful for adding an "electronic" look to grayscale images.
colorcube
contains as many regularly spaced colors in RGB color space as possible, while attempting to provide more steps of gray, pure red, pure green, and pure blue.
cool
consists of colors that are shades of cyan and magenta. It varies smoothly from cyan to magenta.
copper
varies smoothly from black to bright copper.
flag
consists of the colors red, white, blue, and black. This colormap completely changes color with each index increment.
gray
returns a linear grayscale colormap.
hot
varies smoothly from black through shades of red, orange, and yellow, to white.
hsv
varies the hue component of the hue-saturation-value color model. The colors begin with red, pass through yellow, green, cyan, blue, magenta, and return to red. The colormap is particularly appropriate for displaying periodic functions. hsv(m) is the same as hsv2rgb([h ones(m,2)]) where h is the linear ramp, h = (0:m–1)'/m.
jet
ranges from blue to red, and passes through the colors cyan, yellow, and orange. It is a variation of the hsv colormap. The jet colormap is associated with an astrophysical fluid jet simulation from the National Center for Supercomputer Applications. See Examples.
lines
produces a colormap of colors specified by the axes ColorOrder property and a shade of gray.
pink
contains pastel shades of pink. The pink colormap provides sepia tone colorization of grayscale photographs.
prism
repeats the six colors red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet.
spring
consists of colors that are shades of magenta and yellow.
summer
consists of colors that are shades of green and yellow.
white
is an all white monochrome colormap.
winter
consists of colors that are shades of blue and green.
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