# Change default colour palette

**URL:** <https://discourse.slicer.org/t/change-default-colour-palette/8385>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [September 11, 2019, 4:17pm UTC](https://discourse.slicer.org/t/change-default-colour-palette/8385 "2019-09-11T16:17:04Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Lesage](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/discourse.slicer.org/jonathan_lesage/32/4693_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Lesage](https://discourse.slicer.org/u/Jonathan_Lesage)\
**Post date:** [September 11, 2019, 4:17pm UTC](https://discourse.slicer.org/t/change-default-colour-palette/8385/1 "2019-09-11T16:17:04Z")

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Hi All,

I am hoping to change the default colourmap that is applied to all loaded volumes from Grey to a custom map I’ve added to the list by putting a file in the colors directory. Is this something simple to do? Alternatively, I would like to know how to run a script which automatically runs when a new volume is added.

Thanks,

- Jon

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**Author:** ![pieper](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/discourse.slicer.org/pieper/32/8_2.png) [@pieper](https://discourse.slicer.org/u/pieper)\
**Post date:** [September 11, 2019, 7:20pm UTC](https://discourse.slicer.org/t/change-default-colour-palette/8385/2 "2019-09-11T19:20:44Z")

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You could do this yes. You could observe the scene for new nodes and then change the volume’s display node. Search these pages for `slicerrc.py`, `NodeAddedEvent`, and `DisplayNode` to get the idea.

[https://www.slicer.org/wiki/Documentation/Nightly/Developers/Python\_scripting](https://www.slicer.org/wiki/Documentation/Nightly/Developers/Python_scripting)

[https://www.slicer.org/wiki/Documentation/Nightly/ScriptRepository](https://www.slicer.org/wiki/Documentation/Nightly/ScriptRepository)

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**Author:** ![keri](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/discourse.slicer.org/keri/32/11618_2.png) [@keri](https://discourse.slicer.org/u/keri)\
**Post date:** [August 2, 2022, 4:21pm UTC](https://discourse.slicer.org/t/change-default-colour-palette/8385/3 "2022-08-02T16:21:26Z")

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Since then did anything change? I mean is there a default diplay node (for volumes, for models) where I could simply change color node once and do not observe the scene?

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**Author:** ![lassoan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/discourse.slicer.org/lassoan/32/13_2.png) [@lassoan](https://discourse.slicer.org/u/lassoan)\
**Post date:** [August 3, 2022, 6:30am UTC](https://discourse.slicer.org/t/change-default-colour-palette/8385/4 "2022-08-03T06:30:07Z")

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You can change the default color, color node, etc. in a display node and set in the scene as default node to make it the default for all newly loaded nodes.

For DICOM volumes, the default colormap may be overridden depending on the image modality:

> <https://github.com/Slicer/Slicer/blob/38e026f75f78320a2cb579b5fa96f0917ab4f02c/Modules/Scripted/DICOMPlugins/DICOMScalarVolumePlugin.py#L480-L485>