The Color Ramp Options dialog lets the user determine how the contours and vectors will be colored. The user may invoke the Color Options dialog either from the Data menu, or from a button in the Data Browser, Vector Options or Contour Options dialogs.
The default color method is the Solid color option. This method allows the user to select a color from the standard Windows Color Chooser and all contours are displayed with that color. As an alternative, the user can define a ramp of colors. These colors are distributed across the range of contour values in a continuous fashion, giving each contour its own color. If specific contour values are specified, the user controls whether the colors are distributed by index or by value in the upper right portion of the dialog. There are three types of color ramps supported by SMS.
If using the Intensity ramp option, the color ramp will be defined as a continuous variation of the intensity of the default solid color. This is the same color used for the Solid color option.
If the Hue ramp option is chosen, the ramp will be defined as a continuous variation of hues using the hue-saturation-value color model.
In either of the first two cases, the ramp can be edited to include only a portion of the entire ramp, or converted to a user defined palette for further editing. The user modifies the portion of the ramp to be used by setting the minimum and maximum values for hue or intensity with the scroll bars in the Color Options dialog. These controls specify where the minimum value will be mapped into the ramp and where the maximum value will be mapped. The reverse button changes the direction of the color gradation in the color ramp