Getting Started

In this lesson, youÆll animate the silo hatch opening, and the missile launching.

Freeze the terrain

When youÆre animating an object, it often helps to freeze other objects. This way you donÆt accidentally select the wrong object.

1. Load the file start_animation.gmax.

   There are four views of the scene. YouÆll expand the User viewport and freeze the terrain object.

2. Right-click inside the User viewport to activate it.

   

3. On the status bar, in the navigation controls area, click the Min/Max Toggle button to maximize the User viewport.

4. Move your cursor over the objects in the scene. When you stop moving, after a pause a tooltip appears with the name of the object the cursor is over. When the tooltip displays terrain, click to select the terrain object.

5. Right-click over the terrain object and choose Freeze Selection from the quad menu.

   The tooltip no longer displays, and you canÆt select the terrain.

Animate the hatch opening

To animate an object, you turn on the Animate button and then advance the time slider to another point in time, or keyframe. Then you move, rotate, or scale the object. The software calculates the changes for the frames in between the keyframes.

1. Turn on the Animate button.

2. Drag the time slider to frame 50.

3. Click the top of the missile silo to select the object called hatch.

   

4. Right-click over the hatch object and choose Rotate from the quad menu.

   You can also click the Rotate button on the main toolbar to activate Select and Rotate.

5. Place the cursor over the X axis of the transform gizmo and then drag down to open the hatch. Rotate the hatch 100 degrees to open it.

   

   Tip: To see the angle of rotation look at the X field in the status bar as you drag down. If you want, you can enter 100 in this field, instead of rotating using the mouse.

   

6. On the status bar, click Go To Start, and then click Play.

   The hatch slowly opens, revealing a missile inside.

Animate launching the missile

YouÆve animated a rotation transformation with the hatch; now youÆll animate a move transformation with the missile.

1. Click the Min/Max Toggle button to minimize the view.

2. In the Left viewport, change to a Wireframe view. Do this by right-clicking the viewport label and choosing Wireframe from the pop-up menu.

3. Maximize the Left viewport.

4. Zoom the view back until the entire terrain is visible.

   

5. Press the H key, and choose the missile in the Select Objects dialog.

   The wireframe of the missile turns white to show itÆs selected. The hatch is not fully open until frame 50, so the missile should take off at frame 50. YouÆll set a key at frame 50 and another at frame 100.

6. Press the SPACEBAR on the keyboard to lock the selection.

   Now you wonÆt accidentally select another object while youÆre animating the missile.

7. Make sure the time slider is at frame 50 and that the Animate button is turned on.

8. On the Motion panel > PRS Parameters rollout > Create Key group, click Position.

   A key appears at frame 50 on the track bar.

9. Advance the time slider to frame 100.

10. On the main toolbar, turn on Select And Move.

11. In the Left viewport, drag along the Y axis to move the missile upward.

    

12. Minimize the Left viewport.

13. Right-click the Camera viewport to select it, and click Play.

    The hatch slowly opens and the missile takes off.

14. Activate the Left viewport and play the animation again.

    This time the animation plays much faster. The animation playback can be slower when the viewport is set to Smooth+Highlights shading.

15. Save your work as myanimation1.gmax.

Next

Animating the Charger and the Character