Scene animation with Animator
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OK, I think I am making some progress/learning. Here is my latest video. Visibility Test.mp4
I realize this is not very complicated but during the development process, I think I have learned some new things about how to do some things. Now I want to try to combine this with something in another scene so that I can have two scenes in a model that combines capabilities like this. At the rate I am going/earning though, this will probably not happen for a couple of days.
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@ntxdave said in Scene animation with Animator:
this will probably not happen for a couple of days
But what you learn is permanent. That is why I advocate for people to stay the course and troubleshoot themselves.
Plus you get a dopamine hit every time you figure stuff out. Getting spoon fed answers has the opposite effect.
Download the free D'oh Book for SketchUp 📖
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@Rich-O-Brien said in Scene animation with Animator:
@ntxdave said in Scene animation with Animator:
this will probably not happen for a couple of days
But what you learn is permanent. That is why I advocate for people to stay the course and troubleshoot themselves.
Plus you get a dopamine hit every time you figure stuff out. Getting spoon fed answers has the opposite effect.
Thanks @rich-o-brien
Don’t give up on meI am going to figure this stuff out. I think from what I learned today (by first looking at an old video and file that I did a few years ago) and the applying some of the same things (primarily the visibility feature). When I get back to this, I want to try the following:
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Save what I have done so far as a clip
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Create a second scene that has some similar features as the existing one (visibility and animation)
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Possibily, but maybe not right away, camera positioning.
Again, thanks for the response and if I have offended @fredo6 in any way i apologize. I am going to figure this stuff out and learn how to take full advantage of the features/capabilities of Animator. IMO it is a great tool that has a lot of power that I hope I can use for some things I would like to and, hopefully, help others see.
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Again, more progress. As it turns out, I think the problem I was having in the past was not a problem with Animator but rather my lack of understanding of how to use the Visibility tool. Well, I think I have worked it out (still more to learn but definitely making progress). Here is my latest video that includes the use of scenes, camera positions/views, and animations in a scene. While there are some awkward movements, the bottom line is that I was able to accomplish what I was attempting to do. I was able to capture each scene and its movements into a clip. I am sharing the video to let you see that I am moving forward.
Now for a couple of final questions/comments:
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Is there some place where I can learn more about the visibility tool. In particular, when you look at the various options as I have pointed out in this image.
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I think with what I have finally learned, that my idea of an Animator video of an animated model with an introduction scene an animation scene, and a conclusion scene is completely possible.
As always, I would appreciate any comments and I really want to thank both @rich-o-brien and @fredo6 for their patience and the feedback they have given me up to this point.
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@ntxdave said in Scene animation with Animator:
Is there some place where I can learn more about the visibility tool
Not really. Just experiment. Most are default SketchUp features reimagined to be used in an animation scenario. Hover for tooltips.
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OK, will have to”mess around”.
I think Animator is a very strong tool but needs some documentation so that people would/could use it even more.
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@rich-o-brien and @fredo6 I would like to suggest that we set up a new thread category for Animator called Animator Tips and Tricks that hopefully would give Animator some more attention. If you look at the image below, I would then like to suggest that you also set up some subcategories as outlined in the image.
Hope you guys do not think I am crazy. As I learn more, I think that Animator has a lot of power, but people do not know how to take advantage of it .
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There are videos and there is already a Tip and Trick thread for Animator.
My plan is to rewrite the UI of Animator, but only once the Mac version of Sketchup is migrated to Qt and share the same code as on Windows. I will lkely use HTML dialogs to have a better positioning of the UI elements in the workspace (especially if you have multiple screens) and a more guided interface.
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@fredo6 said in Scene animation with Animator:
There are videos and there is already a Tip and Trick thread for Animator.
Yes, I know there are videos (and I have watched several) but as you can tell from this thread, there are times when I have problems finding answers about some tools. I did not find the Tip and Trick thread for Animator. Can you give me a link?
My plan is to rewrite the UI of Animator, but only once the Mac version of Sketchup is migrated to Qt and share the same code as on Windows. I will lkely use HTML dialogs to have a better positioning of the UI elements in the workspace (especially if you have multiple screens) and a more guided interface.
Looking forward to this.
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@ntxdave said in Scene animation with Animator:
Can you give me a link?
It is pinned to this suforum.
Animator Beta
General discussion about Animator for SketchUp
sketchucation (community.sketchucation.com)
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I am suddenly getting a message that my license expired on 23 Jan 2026 and I do not know how to update/get it working again. Right now I cannot use Animator.
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Are your extensions up to date?
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Yes. - according to the SketchUcation manager.
I just sent @fredo6 my email address so he can send me some license information
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OK guys, I think I have a model here that I think shows you can have something like I talked about before. Although there are some things I need to update (in particular the camera position/distance) on the Animation scene the model has 3 basic scenes. An Introduction scene (which is what I will use at the beginning of some future models), an Animation scene (which is the "main part of the model") where I will do the main features of presenting the model, and a Conclusion scene (which is where I will present some information like - in this case thank the donor of the plaques I modeled).
I hope this might at least get people to think about the wide range that Animator has and how it can be used (IMO) to present models.
Here is the "rough" model" 3 Scene Animator.skp
Once again, I appreciate any comments you might have.
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OK - this was the wrong version of the file.
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It's obviously a personal project. Well done persevering.
Now you get to polish and improve while adding to your knowledge.
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Somehow several updates did not get included in the file I posted before. I am going to try to update the file and post it again with the additional things I have been working on. What I am doing with this (at this point) is not the final version I have in mind but rather an example of where you can go with Animator. Hope to be able to include the updates within the next couple of days. I spent a good amount of time yesterday and do not know what happened to my updates.
I do appreciate your feedback though. I have leaned some "shortcuts" during the process yesterday that really came/come in handy.
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OK, I think I have fixed the problems I had with the file I uploaded before. But now I have a new problem. I fixed things in the file (as I just said) however when I click on the button to generate a video, nothing happens. I am including a copy of the file that I hope someone can generate a video for me and maybe someone else can tell me what has happened. I have not had a problem generating a video before.
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I am continuing to have problems. It seems like some files will allow me to generate a movie and some will not.
Hers is a file that "seems" to be OK and in Animator I can see everything, but when I try to generate the video, nothing happens.
3 Scene Animator.skp (This is a version that I updated today)BTW: I tried both with clips for each section and without them and get the same result. Everything plays fine in Animator, but it will not let me generate a video.
I am beginning to wonder if I should just give up.
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Top Part of Ruby Console:
#<NoMethodError: undefined method
custom_convert_id' for Traductor::ChromiumWdlg:Class> c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6weblist.rbe:159:incid'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6weblist.rbe:44:ininitialize__' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/lib6weblist.rbe:33:ininitialize'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorvideomanager.rbe:1666:innew' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorvideomanager.rbe:1666:injob_dialog_select_repair'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorvideomanager.rbe:1641:injob_detect_repairing' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatortool.rbe:2293:inmovie_clip_generation'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorpalette.rbe:820:inblock in palette_clip_name_duration_video' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6palette.rbe:4100:inexecute_button'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6palette.rbe:3854:inonLButtonUp' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/lib6palette.rbe:103:inonLButtonUp'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatortool.rbe:1293:in `onLButtonUp'Nothing in the bottom part of the Ruby Console.
I hope this helps.
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