Exploring the Crystalline World
From metals to zeolites, benzene to proteins:
CrystalMaker is the easiest way to visualize and understand
structures of crystals and molecules.
CrystalMaker lets you quickly browse
multiple structures, combine them, define custom views, and animate them.
What is CrystalMaker?
Welcome to CrystalMaker: an award-winning program
for building, displaying, manipulating and animating all kinds
of crystal & molecular structures.
CrystalMaker provides a streamlined workflow that majors on
productivity: just drag-and-drop your data files into the
program for instant display
in spectacular photo-realistic colour. Manipulate structures in
real time, with the mouse. Multiple View
"bookmarks" and undo levelsencourage exploration and
discovery - ideal for teaching and research.
Build Crystals & Molecules Fast!
With CrystalMaker you can build any kind of crystal or
molecular structure - quickly and easily. Built-in symmetry
handling and the elegant spacegroup browser takes the slog out
of crystallography, and the program will automatically generate
all your bonds and polyhedra.
CrystalMaker provides a wide range of model types, including
traditional "ball-and-stick", space-filling, polyhedral,
wireframe and thermal ellipsoids. Each model type can be
extensively customized, with the option of photo-realistic
graphics or simpler, line-art display.
Comprehensive Data Import & Export
Load structural data from over 15+ formats, including Cambridge Structures
Database, Protein Data Bank, CIF, GSAS, SHELX, etc.
You can work with virtually unlimited numbers of atoms. Take advantage of
our unique "Depth Profiling" tool, to rapidly scan ares of
interest in massive structures - ideal for characterizing the
results from computer models.
A range of output options is available for sharing data with
other programs, saving structural data, bond distances,
coordination environments - or even building web pages with
your data.
Outstanding 3D Graphics
Enjoy photo-realistic graphics with depth fading and perspective -
plus spectacular 3D stereo. Benefit from high-resolution printing
and save your graphics at user-defined sizes to a wide range of formats.
Work with massive structures, using depth profiling and
measurement. Bonds and polyhedra are automatically generated,
with full error propagation, plus cluster shell and coordination
network visualization and powerful output options.
Real-Time Manpulation & Measurement
Click-and-drag with the mouse, use the keyboard, or toolbar. View
parallel to a lattice vector or plane normal. Continuous plot range
settings for millions of atoms, bonds and polyhedra.
Move, detach, duplicate, hide, delete groups of atoms. Hide or
repair molecular fragments - isolate individual molecules.
Display lattice planes in any orientation; slice the crystal to
investigate surfaces or internal planes - and place one structure or
molecule inside another.
Preview coordination environments, clusters and shells; list bond
distances and histograms on screen or save to disc. Measure bond
distances, angles, torsion angles on screen. Calculate angles
between planes and/or vectors.
Illustrated History
CrystalMaker gives you multiple undo levels for each window - each
with its own graphical thumbnail, displayed in the "History" pane of
the Overview window. You can also bookmark custom Views and
organize your favourite files.
Animation
CrystalMaker is the first program of its kind to go beyond
static structures, to let you explore structural behaviour
quickly and easily.
Just drag-and-drop files into the
same window, then rearrange their thumbnails to build your
movie timeline.
Frames from a CrystalMaker animation, showing
the temperature-driven relaxation of
six-membered aluminosilicate rings in the crystal structure
of leucite. Data from Palmer et al. (1997)
American Mineralogist 82:16-29.
View thumbnails can be browsed and animated on screen,
with the option of a full-screen slideshow. Manipulate and
synchronize views, drag-and-drop thumbnails to rearrange them,
then output the entire sequence as a QuickTime movie with
the new Save as Movie command.
Both Mac and Windows versions let you record QuickTime movies as you work, with full control over frame
rates and compression settings.
QuickTime VR
CrystalMaker was the first application of its kind to support
QuickTime Virtual Reality (VR).
With this technology, you can save a self-contained,
fully-rotatable model of your crystal or molecule. The
resulting model can be viewed in any QuickTime-savvy
application or web browser, on Mac or Windows. Users can
rotate the model just by clicking and dragging the mouse -
no complicated plug-ins to download or interfaces to load!
Ideal for multimedia, presentations and student browsing.
Diffraction Support
Diffraction patterns can be simulated for any displayed
crystal structure, with just a single menu command - thanks to
our CrystalDiffract
(powder diffraction)
and SingleCrystal
(X-ray, neutron and TEM single-crystal diffraction) programs.
SingleCrystal can be linked with CrystalMaker, so as you
rotate your structure its diffraction pattern rotates, and
vice versa.
Cross Platform
CrystalMaker is available in two separate versions, for
Windows (XP/Vista/Windows 7), or for Mac OS X (Snow Leopard/Leopard/Tiger).
Mac and Windows versions share the same binary file
format, and similar feature sets, making cross-platform
working and collaboration easy!
Each version is designed, from the ground up, for its
respective operating system, offering genuine operating
system support and maximum performance - with no
compromises.
First-Class Support
Using CrystalMaker is easy - but we still provide a a
lavishly-illustrated setup guide, a detailed User's Guide in PDF
format, for easy searching and of course a cross-referenced online
help system. The software is shipped on CD-ROM, with over 600
structures, fully-annotated, ready for immediate display: from
organic molecules to zeolites, and from dental ceramics to
high-T c superconductors.
Last, but not least, we're proud of our first-class technical
support, which includes regular incremental software updates, as
well as a prompt and personalized response to queries.
