# Horizontal color bar with vertical tick labels

**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Created:** [December 9, 2025, 1:06am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356 "2025-12-09T01:06:26Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/sam_austin/32/15961_2.png) [@Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Sam_Austin)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 1:06am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/1 "2025-12-09T01:06:26Z")

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I am working with a horizontal colorbar. How can I rotate the numbers to run vertically instead of being displayed horizontally like they are currently? They are all smashed into each other. I want to be able to do something like this (copied from a different reference – I’m not sure what visualization software they use).

Thanks!

 ![image](https://discourse.paraview.org/uploads/default/original/3X/b/3/b3f7a5ab0350ea924c87a427b09c5f672734b5ca.png)

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### Author: ![Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/sam_austin/32/15961_2.png) [@Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Sam_Austin)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 4:10pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/2 "2025-12-09T16:10:58Z")

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Or, if this is not supported, could you give me a pointer as to where in the source code I could find the relevant code that govern the layout of the text in the colorbar labels? I might try implementing this feature.

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### Author: ![cory.quammen](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/cory.quammen/32/11193_2.png) [@cory.quammen](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cory.quammen)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 10:24pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/3 "2025-12-09T22:24:30Z")

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Hi @sam_austin, you are running into this issue: [https://gitlab.kitware.com/paraview/paraview/-/issues/20227](https://gitlab.kitware.com/paraview/paraview/-/issues/20227)

There is no option in ParaView to orient the text as you desire, but that is an interesting idea for a feature.

The code that generates the axis, including labels, is in VTK under `VTK/Charts/Core/vtkAxis.h/.cxx`. The color legend itself, which uses `vtkAxis`, is in ParaView under `Remoting/Views/vtkContext2DScalarBarActor.cxx`.

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### Author: ![wascott](https://discourse.paraview.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8e8cbc/32.png) [@wascott](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/wascott)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 10:31pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/4 "2025-12-09T22:31:34Z")

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Great idea. Thanks for posting.

[https://gitlab.kitware.com/paraview/paraview/-/issues/23161](https://gitlab.kitware.com/paraview/paraview/-/issues/23161)

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### Author: ![Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/sam_austin/32/15961_2.png) [@Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Sam_Austin)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 11:29pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/5 "2025-12-09T23:29:14Z")

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Hi all, thanks for the response here. I will play around and see if I can get something working.

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### Author: ![Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/sam_austin/32/15961_2.png) [@Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Sam_Austin)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2025, 5:00am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/6 "2025-12-10T05:00:43Z")

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> [@cory.quammen](#):
>
> vtkContext2DScalarBarActor.cxx

Thanks for this reference. Would you mind pointing me to the equivalent source file for the primary axis painters? It would help me resolve the other issue I posted: [Remove Axis Tick Labels](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/remove-axis-tick-labels/17355) :

I see that the vtkAxis class supports independent booleans `LabelsVisible` and `TicksVisible`, although in vtkContext2DScalarBarActor.cxx the two are toggled together. This means that there is not a way to independently toggle the visibility of the tick marks and the numerical labels, which is precisely what I am trying to do in the other issue. I just need to locate the source for the primary axis configuration to implement this change.

Thanks!

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### Author: ![cory.quammen](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/cory.quammen/32/11193_2.png) [@cory.quammen](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cory.quammen)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2025, 6:02pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/7 "2025-12-10T18:02:54Z")

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> [@Sam\_Austin](#):
>
> Would you mind pointing me to the equivalent source file for the primary axis painters?

`vtkAxis` handles all the axis painting. Or do you mean something else?

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### Author: ![Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/sam_austin/32/15961_2.png) [@Sam\_Austin](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Sam_Austin)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2025, 5:45pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/horizontal-color-bar-with-vertical-tick-labels/17356/8 "2025-12-11T17:45:20Z")

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Got it, that’s what I’m looking for, thanks.