Scene animation with Animator

ntxdave

OK - this was the wrong version of the file.

Rich O Brien

It's obviously a personal project. Well done persevering.

Now you get to polish and improve while adding to your knowledge.

ntxdave

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.

ntxdave

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.

3 Scene Animator.skp

ntxdave

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.

ntxdave

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:in cid'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6weblist.rbe:44:in initialize__' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/lib6weblist.rbe:33:in initialize'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorvideomanager.rbe:1666:in new' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorvideomanager.rbe:1666:in job_dialog_select_repair'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorvideomanager.rbe:1641:in job_detect_repairing' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatortool.rbe:2293:in movie_clip_generation'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_animator/animatorpalette.rbe:820:in block in palette_clip_name_duration_video' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6palette.rbe:4100:in execute_button'
c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/body_lib6palette.rbe:3854:in onLButtonUp' c:/users/doppy/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2026/sketchup/plugins/fredo6_!libfredo6/lib6palette.rbe:103:in onLButtonUp'
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.

fredo6

I found the issue. The error should happen if you open a model and go immediately to generate the video. If you open other dialogs of my plugins., it should work fine

It should go better with LibFredo6 v15.8d, just released

ntxdave

@fredo6 said in Scene animation with Animator:

I found the issue. The error should happen if you open a model and go immediately to generate the video. If you open other dialogs of my plugins., it should work fine

It should go better with LibFredo6 v15.8d, just released

Thank you so much.

I was about to give up but after updating to the LibFredo6 v15.8d I was able to generate the video.
In fact, I was also able to create a 2nd version of the model with everything done in clips. Again

So, here are some videos I was able to create with the 2 versions of the file (one without clips and the other with clips).

Without clips:
3 Scene Animator.mp4
Model Animation.gif

With Clips
3 Scene Animation With Clips.mp4
3 Scene Animation With Clips.gif

I hope this shows that you can have multiple animated scenes in a SU model and use Animator to "show them off".

ntxdave

@rich-o-brien Thanks for the upvote Rich.

Updated on 02/03/2026

My whole purpose here was to demonstrate that you can have multiple scenes with animations and information that can be displayed Animator. The one I displayed is not what I want as a final product was just something to show how you can use the features of Animator (like introduction, animation(s), and conclusion) without having to have an external video editor.

Throughout this exercise I think I have learned a lot about Animator like:

How to combine items to create a “clip”
How to “explode” a clip to edit items within the clip
How to create and edit Layer visibility controls. As an example this can be used to I used this in the “Introduction” to control the display of line text one line at a time.
How to create/capture and edit (at least to some level) camera settings/positions.
I also figured how to take advantage of camera feature, along with the layer visibility controls, to “somewhat” control the transition between scenes.
I think I also learned some things about using the movement tools.

Things I need to learn more about (IMO):

How to better control the transition from one scene or clip to another one. I think there are options for this but I do not know how/have not figured out. I would like to “fade” between them.
I have not experimented with the “translation” tool/feature I would like to be able to use something like section cuts to control the exposure of items or text.

I hope all of this makes sense. The more I learn about Animator the better I like it and would like to help promote it’s use.

ntxdave

I am having some problems trying to control/set cameras when I have multiple scenes. In the attached file, I have a camera position for the Introduction scene, a second one for the Animation scene, and a third one for the Conclusion scene. I have tried capturing the camera setting for each of the scenes and adding them to the animation clip in the appropriate scene. What I am experiencing is that I set/capture the camera position in one of the scenes it gets carried over/applied to each of the other scenes. I hope someone can look at the file and tell me how to resolve the issue. I want the scene in the clip to match the scene if you click on the scene name. Hope that makes sense to anyone who looks at the file.

OK, file is too large to upload.