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I am using Windows 10. I cannot change the waterfall colors. Is there something I am doing wrong, or is this a know error?

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Thanks, Roy de K2RMA

Hmmm, I've done this a long time ago but maybe I am having a 1d10t moment.....I still cannot get the background of the waterfall to change to any color - it's black!

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1. Configure --> Waterfall --> Display

2. Load new pallete, for instance yellow, click big Save button (for the dialog, not for the pallette)

3. My expectation is the background should now be yellow

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Thanks, Roy

Hello Roy,


This 'background' color topic appears to be a misconception:

The waterfall background is not defined separately (as for text windows), but is part of (and actually the very first) color defined in the waterfall palette.


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Since usually, brighter colors are more likely to be interpreted as louder signals, most palettes are defined this way, with a black to dark (mostly blue) background and any signals showing as brighter waterfall portions.


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In the FLdigi palette definition '.pal' files, there's a list of 9 lines, each consisting of 3 colon (;) separated values (integer from 0 = darkest to 255 = brightest per color channel), as follows:

Line 1: RED;GREEN;BLUE <== 'BACKGROUND' color without signals present
::::::::::::::::::::::
Line 9: RED;GREEN;BLUE <== 'SIGNAL' color for the strongest signals

The lower the values, the darker the color. A mix of (bright) RED and GREEN results in a yellow color, a mix of GREEN and BLUE in CYAN, RED and BLUE in MAGENTA, etc.


If you wish to change the colors of the waterfall, you may do so in the Config - Waterfall - Display Dialog:

A) By loading a pre-defined '.pal' file via the 'Load...' Button.

B) You may also open such a '.pal' file with any simple text editor (e.g. Notepad), edit the values, and save it, potentially under a new name.

C) Or adapt each of the 9 color values manually, by clicking the respective Color Button just below the horizontal waterfall color scheme.
-> In the attached screenshot, the leftmost and rightmost buttons are marked up as 'L' and 'H', for Low and High intensity, respectively.

D) Once you have modified the waterfall color settings, you may save your new personal '.pal' file via the 'Save...' Button. It will then be used until you change it again.


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In the attachment, you'll find both a standard and a negative palette example for direct use in FLdigi (via the 'Load...' Button).

The compiled screenshot shows, side by side, the standard and negative palette examples, both in the Config Dialog and, below, in the resulting waterfall. THe shown DigiMode is an RSID followed by a loud MFSK32 signal, about 500 Hz wide, centered at 2800 Hz.

Here, the 'negative' palette is just a descending-sorted version of the original one, thus the background appears yellow, not white. But you can always change the background to pure white or any other color as described above. In other words, the attached negative example is not optimized for best visualization yet.


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The attached definitions were called 'contrast' because they feature an intentional non-linearity (knee or step) in the brightness, mainly in-between the 5th and 6th color.
On top, at the very end, at least in the standard definition, the color changes from white to bright yellow, highlighting especially loud signals.

Such a 'step' (which could be defined even more abruptly, or 'steep') helps visualize weak signals above a given noise floor, provided the waterfall brightness setting (the 'upper signal level' field down left below the waterfall) is carefully adjusted to the specific case. This may help view such faint traces better than a truly linear waterfall palette. But remember that the waterfall signal range field (right next to the level field) also allows changing the 'contrast' on the fly.

You may note that the colors chosen here are quite limited, just ranging from blue to white and yellow. This is a personal choice, based on the finding, that a palette with fewer colors usually is easier to interpret than one with a high(er) number of different colors, which may, admittedly, provide more visual information, yet in a harder to 'digest' way.


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FLdigi is remarkably flexible in this respect, too, and allows a very versatile adjustment of the useful waterfall visualization to match any user preference.

In my opinion, the standard palettes provide a better visual signal representation, but the negative option may be preferable in certain cases, too.


Hope this will help you find your preferred waterfall color settings.



73s Tobias
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Thank you. I have not used fldigi in a long time due to the curse of pickleball. Thank you everyone for reminding me the details?