Animator: Parametric Animation plugin - Discussion
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I publish here video tutorials showing some features from Animator, based on public videos posted on YouTube.
For the tutorial below, I have used a model with a simple forklift and pallet.
Credit to Burckhard Heimlich for the Forklift modelHere is the original model (SU2015)
Burkhard Heimlich - SU15 - Gabelstapler - 0.skpThe final animation is shown below in Natural mode (i.e. without rendering) and Rendered mode with some rendering software supporting integration with Animator. It is advised to watch the video in Full Screen mode, to see the details.
In Natural mode (No rendering)
Rendered with AmbientOcclusionEx
Many thanks to the Fluid Interactive team, in particular Nicola and AlbertoRendered with Thea (no model preparation)
Many thanks to the Thea team, in particular tomaszRendered with SketchFX (no model preparation)
Many thanks to the Fluid Interactive team, in particular Nicola and AlbertoRendered with Twilight Render Pro
Many thanks to the Twilight team team, in particular Chris1) Preparing the Model
Animation should come at the end of the design process, so that most of the objects are in place. Note that Animator allows to add new objects, but modifying the hierarchy of objects already referenced by Animator may cause undesired issues.
Note: I use the term Object to designate both Groups and Components. Animator supports both. Note that the main difference is that when you animate objects which are inside a component, this affects the other instances of the component. When you select a Component Instance, Animator always shows the other instances that would be affected.
Here are a few advices to prepare the model for Animation, essentially around
- Verifying the Grouping of objects. Grouping is a nice way to transform objects as a whole (even if multi-selection is supported). For instance, a car should be an object, embedding sub-objects such as the car body and the wheels, so that you can move the car while spinning the wheels.Deciding about Groups versus Components, making unique component instances, etc... are the kind of decisions you need to think about.
- Naming the Objects: It will make it easier when selecting objects in the Movement Editor. Animator selection displays a popup showing the hierarchy objects under the mouse, so that you can pick the right one. If no name is given, then you will see "Group" or "Component", as in the example below:
[attachment=3:1mluf46k]<!-- ia3 -->Animator - Group Selection.png<!-- ia3 -->[/attachment:1mluf46k] - Creating Layers. Animator records the layer visibility when recording cameras. So it is better to create them before starting the design of an animation.
- Saving the original object positions. Animator includes a Positioner utility, allowing to save the position of all Objects in the model and later restore it. You can save several positions. As there may be bug or mis-manipulation, it is always good to keep a reference positioner so that you can restablish conistent object positions. This is useful, because Undo will not work (objects moves are transparent)
2) Creating a First Animation
The following tutorial shows how to create a basic animation.
3) Finishing the Object Animation
We can now finish the object animation. The tutorial shows how to re-use existing movements and modify / adjust the animation after it is built.
4) Adding Cameras
You will see how to create travelling views with simple cameras and how they are interpolated (fade-out)
5) Installing FFmpeg (MS Windows)
FFmpeg is an open source tool, free, which is used by Animator to generate video files. The tutorial shows how to do the installation once.
6) Generating a video
The tutorial shows how to generate a video at specified dimensions and frame rate, with several options available.
7) Launching / Stopping the Animation
This video tutorial explains the different ways to start, pause, stop and navigate through the Animation in Editor and Player mode.
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Tracking Cameras]A tracking camera is a camera attached to an object with a certain viewpoint. This allows to follow the object when it moves.
Tracking cameras supports the Fade-out option, so that you can smoothly switch between two tracking cameras following the same object. Fade out also works to make a smooth transition with other cameras.
9) Layer Visibility
Animator supports two methods to control Layer Visibility
- STATE: capture of the visibility state of ALL layers. This can be done via the Visual Effect Layer State, or via a View or Scene Camera
- ON-OFF: Specify the visibility state for given layers
Layer on-off is more adapted to super-impose layer visibility changes since you can control layer by layer.
Note that when these visual effects have a duration > 0, they are ignored when the animation time is after.
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"I publish here video tutorials showing some features from Animator"
Excellent tutorial help videos. Thank you so very much for taking the time to do these. -
This is so great and pushes SketchUp to an high level similar to Sketchy- and MSPhysics. The videos and tutorials show that impressive. Is there somewhere a link to download and to test the plugin?
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It's in beta test Period! Ask Fredo or Rich O Brien...
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@faust07 said:
This is so great and pushes SketchUp to an high level similar to Sketchy- and MSPhysics. The videos and tutorials show that impressive. Is there somewhere a link to download and to test the plugin?
If you are meaning the Animator plugin, see this thread If you are meaning the Twilight Render software, they have stated that they will be posting a link to their software sometime today. You will have to have the Pro version though (at least that is my understanding).
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@thomthom said:
New round of donations for Fredo - anyone?
Could You send me info how to do that?
This many is treasure who earned our support. -
I'm eagerly awaiting your newest plug-in Fredo. Having been tasked with creating some animations, SketchUp is where I wish to do it so your excellent tools help enormously.
One question, will Animate have a path tool so I could make my shapes/groups follow paths other than straight lines?
Kelly
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@ntxdave said:
If you are meaning the Animator plugin, see this thread
I get:
"You are not authorised to read this forum."
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@thomthom said:
@fredo6 said:
But I don't know how to reach the others
PM me who you are looking for - I'll see what I can do. I have the ChaosGroup contacts for sure - but I should be able to obtain other as well.
Oh, that would be ideal. If this could work with Shaderlight renderer, my world would be complete. I'm currently using "Keyframe Animation", however, it will not work with Shaderlight. Therefore, I cannot complete my animations by rendering them. The still only look like cartoons. Thank you for all of your efforts with this!
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@johndurnan said:
Oh, that would be ideal. If this could work with Shaderlight renderer, my world would be complete.
I need to find a contact there (which I don't have at the moment), in case they would be interested.
Fredo
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is there a newer version of the animator plugin, I was trying it out (great) but since upgrading to 2017 it says it has expired. I tried it back in 2016, same message. How might it be possible to get the latest version. Is it available for purchase?
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@whiterabbit said:
is there a newer version of the animator plugin, I was trying it out (great) but since upgrading to 2017 it says it has expired. I tried it back in 2016, same message. How might it be possible to get the latest version. Is it available for purchase?
ThanksThe latest version is now on the PluginStore
The discussion forum on Animator is also public.
Latest version is Animator v1.2h, which requires LibFredo6 7.2h.
Fredo
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Hello Fredo
Small enhancement (if possible): could you replace red crosses against green slash
inside Maintenance of Animator Objects ?The Help comment is confusing ( you delete a red cross !)
Pierre
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These are ACTION buttons, not STATUS buttons.
So the red cross is to delete, the green check mark is to undelete, and the red color for the whole row indicates the status.
If you are better icons however, I am interested.
Fredo
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Could such a picture fit the function ?
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@malaise said:
Could such a picture fit the function ?
Very nice icons, but I would (and maybe will when appropriate) use them for MERGE and SPLIT.
However, if the single rectangle is replaced by a red bin, that would be perfectFredo
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Like that ?
Cheers
Pierre
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That's the idea. But then
- could you replace the 3 parallelograms by one
- could you make the arrow a little bit bigger and contrasted so that they are visible when the icons are of reduced size (i.e. fitting in the table).
Thanks
Fredo
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Here, you'll find some material.
Cheers
Pierre
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