An R color palette for {ggplot2} using NOAA Fisheries branding colors.

{nmfspalette} implements these steps to create a {ggplot2} compatible palette according to NOAA Fisheries branding (NOAA internal only).

You can install the development version of nmfspalette from GitHub with:

# install.packages("pak")
pak::pak("nmfs-ost/nmfspalette")

To load the package, use:

library(nmfspalette)

We welcome contributions to {nmfspalette}. You are welcome to make any changes you would like on a fork and submit a pull request. For more substantial changes or to create a branch, please contact [email protected] (NOAA Affiliates only). We ask that all contributors adhere to The NOAA Fisheries Integrated Toolbox code of conduct.

To learn how to use nmfspalette, please check out the interactive learnr tutorial.

Extract an interpolated color palette from the default “oceans” palette.

You can change the number of colors (10 shown below).

nmfs_palette("oceans")(10)
#>  [1] "#C6E6F0" "#8CCBE3" "#53B0D7" "#1F95CF" "#0072BB" "#004295" "#002B7B"
#>  [8] "#002467" "#001D55" "#001743"

New feature: With the new theme_nmfs() function, you can add a NMFS-colored theme to your ggplot objects! This new theme that applies NMFS color palettes and theme-related elements (such as label sizes, borders, axis lines, and more) to a plot.

library(ggplot2)
ggplot(mtcars, aes(x = mpg, y = disp, color = as.factor(cyl))) +
  geom_point(size = 3) +
  nmfspalette::theme_nmfs(discrete = TRUE, interpolate = TRUE, palette = "crustacean")
#> Warning: This function may not work if your `ggplot2` version is below 4.0.0. Update your package version to utilize this new function!
#> This warning is displayed once per session.

Use the all_nmfs_palettes() function to see all available palettes.

all_nmfs_palettes()

Use the display_nmfs_palette() function to see a specific palette.

These palettes contain 4 or 6 colors.

display_nmfs_palette("oceans", 6)

display_nmfs_palette("waves", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("seagrass", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("urchin", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("crustacean", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("coral", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("regional", 6)

For some with color vision deficiency (C.V.D.), it may be difficult to discern the colors in the regional palette. We have provided two alternative regional palettes, below. Note: The alternative palette 1 contains colors that are entirely within the NMFS brand color set; alternative palette 2 does not. However, the colors in alternative palette 1 may be less distinguishable for all types of color perception as opposed to alternative palette 2.

nmfspalette::display_nmfs_palette("regional_alt1", 6)

nmfspalette::display_nmfs_palette("regional_alt2", 6)

These 5 palettes contain 4 complementary colors each and are identical to the main NOAA Fisheries palettes, but some colors have different names. Check out the nmfs_cols.R file for more information.

These palettes contain 4 colors.

display_nmfs_palette("background_sky", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("background_green", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("background_gray", 4)

This palette contains 11 colors.

display_nmfs_palette("core", 11)

These palettes contain 4 colors.

display_nmfs_palette("alert_red", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("alert_orange", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("alert_yellow", 4)

display_nmfs_palette("alert_green", 4)

In addition to nmfs_palette and display_nmfs_palette to get palettes, you can extract colors by name. Please see the NOAA Fisheries Branding guide (NOAA internal only) for color names. Here, for most color names, underscores are used in place of spaces. Colors defined before 2023 have no spaces in the color names.

nmfs_cols("vivid_crustacean")
#> vivid_crustacean 
#>        "#FF8400"
nmfs_cols("processblue")
#> processblue 
#>   "#0085CA"

To use the palettes with {ggplot2}, the scale_color_nmfs() and scale_fill_nmfs() functions are provided. If no argument is given to scale_color_nmfs(), a default (“oceans”) is used:

library(ggplot2)
p <- ggplot(iris, aes(Sepal.Width, Sepal.Length, color = Species)) +
  geom_point(size = 4) +
  scale_color_nmfs()
p

scale_fill_nmfs() does not have a default and therefore requires a named argument, this is an example using the “crustacean” palette:

ggplot(faithfuld, aes(waiting, eruptions)) +
  geom_raster(aes(fill = density)) +
  scale_fill_nmfs(palette = "crustacean", discrete = FALSE, reverse = TRUE)

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U.S. Department of Commerce | National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration | NOAA Fisheries