MOVEMENT THROUGH MACHINE

[ericdjohn]

Re: [Tutorial] Animator Quick Start
Subject: Animator (Fredo6) – Simple Beam Movement Through Machine Animation
Hello everyone,
I'm new to Animator by Fredo6 and am trying to create a very simple industrial animation for sales training purposes.
I have a SketchUp model of a glulam beam sanding machine. The machine itself remains stationary, and I simply want to animate a glulam beam moving through the machine.
My objective is:
Beam starts at the machine entrance.
Beam moves through the machine.
Beam exits the machine.
Eventually I would like to rotate the beam 90° or 180° and run it through again to demonstrate different sanding processes.
The beam is a separate SketchUp Group and can be selected independently from the machine.
So far I have:

• Installed LibFredo6
• Installed Animator v4.6a
• Created a new film
• Opened the Clip Editor and Positioner tools
• Selected the beam group

However, I cannot determine the correct workflow to create the first movement animation.
When I open Positioner → Manage Positioners and click "Save current position as...", nothing appears to happen. No position is created and no prompt appears.
What is the correct sequence of steps to:

• Register the beam as an animated object (actor?)
• Create a starting position
• Create an ending position
• Animate the beam moving from Point A to Point B
• Preview and export the animation

I am not trying to animate machinery, cameras, or complex assemblies. I simply need a beam to travel through a stationary machine.
If anyone has a step-by-step example for moving a single group/component through a model using Animator v4.6a, I would greatly appreciate the help.
Thank you.

[ericdjohn]

[Rich O Brien]

You need to use the Clip Editor (first icon on toolbar) to use the GUI to add a Movement