This web presentation describes three programs: ASA, SOMO and RAZ. The first two programs are used to generate a bead model from atomic coordinates (in PDB format), while the latter is used to visualise the model using Rasmol. The current version (v1) of SOMO uses algorithms based on Trans (Spotorno et al., Eur. Biophys. J. 25, 373-384; 26, 417) and AtoB (Byron, Biophys. J. 72, 408-415). Both SOMO and RAZ were developed by Nithin Rai, Marcelo Nollmann, Olwyn Byron, Ron Poet and Mattia Rocco at the University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK and Istituto Nazionale per la Ricerca sul Cancro, Genova, Italy. Research and development of these programs were supported by grants supplied by BBSRC, EMBO, The Wellcome Trust, The European Community and Agenzia Spaziale Italiana.