rave-dr6-public-talk-visualizations

name	rave-dr6-public-talk-visualizations
description	Turn a nearest-100 RAVE DR6 query into dark-theme, public-talk-ready PNG visualizations with clear titles, readable scaling, and presentation-friendly styling.
version	1.0.0
author	AstroAgent / AIP
license	MIT
metadata	{"hermes":{"tags":["astronomy","rave-dr6","visualization","public-talk","presentation","plotting"],"category":"astronomy","related_skills":["rave-dr6","rave-dr6-nearest-100-plot"]}}

RAVE DR6 Public Talk Visualizations

When to Use

Use this skill when the user wants RAVE DR6 outputs suitable for talks, outreach slides, or clean presentation graphics rather than only a research-style quicklook.

Procedure

1. Start from the canonical query workflow

Use rave-dr6 for generic querying, or rave-dr6-nearest-100-plot if the task is already specifically about the nearest 100 stars.

2. Save the nearest-100 subset locally

df.to_parquet('rave_dr6_closest100.parquet', index=False)

3. Use a dark presentation theme

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
plt.rcParams.update({
    'figure.facecolor': '#0D1117',
    'axes.facecolor': '#0D1117',
    'savefig.facecolor': '#0D1117',
    'text.color': 'white',
    'axes.labelcolor': 'white',
    'xtick.color': 'white',
    'ytick.color': 'white',
})

4. Produce two public-ready PNGs

Recommended outputs:

• rave_dr6_publictalk_galactic.png
• rave_dr6_publictalk_radec.png

Use:

• larger markers than the research quicklook
• clear title and subtitle wording
• colorbar with readable label
• no cluttered legends
• consistent dark background and high contrast

5. Suggested styling choices

• Figure size: 8x6 or 10x6
• DPI: 300
• Marker size: 40–100 depending on overlap
• Highlight the Sun in Galactic plots with a gold marker
• Prefer concise titles, e.g.:
  • 100 nearest RAVE DR6 stars
  • Galactic projection
  • RA vs Dec sky distribution

6. Deliverables

• the parquet table for reuse
• two PNGs for presentation use
• optional one-sentence captions for slide insertion

Canonical Routing

This is a specialized or legacy example skill. For new work, start with astro-data-access-umbrella and route through:

• rave-dr6-data-access
• astro-catalog-plotting-cache

Keep this skill for dataset-specific examples, but prefer the canonical skills for new implementations, live probes, REANA execution, and plotting/cache conventions.

Pitfalls

• Do not mix this presentation-oriented skill with generic TAP debugging; start from rave-dr6 if the query itself is uncertain.
• Do not overload the figure with too many annotations.
• Keep outputs as PNG for easy slide insertion.
• If the scientific plot is the priority rather than presentation quality, use rave-dr6-nearest-100-plot instead.

Verification

• Both PNGs open correctly and are readable on a dark slide background.
• Titles and labels are legible in presentation scale.
• The parquet table and PNG files are all written successfully.