Animating Operations
The effect of any Operation that has
"Parameters" can be animated. A Parameter is an option that the Operation uses
to determine how to affect the object. For example, the Material Fill operation has
parameters of Color, Transparency etc. Virtually every Operation Parameter can be animated
over time.
Each position on the animation slider is a key-frame time. You may change the
parameters of the Operations for each object at each key-frame time on the slider. When
the animation is played, 3D Canvas will interpolate between these key-frames.
Only Operations that have been applied in animation mode can be animated. There are two
ways to change the parameters for a Operation.
1) The Update function of the Layers List will display the
update function for operations.
2) The Adjust tool of the Edit Toolbar allows you to
adjust the effect of operations using the edit control.
Note that simply applying another operation to an object at a second time in the
animation will not produce an animated operation. It will simply apply another animatable
operation. This allows for multiple operations of the same type to be applied to an object
and animated independently.
will be in a
"pushed" state whenever the object you are animating is at an interpolated
position rather than a key-frame position. If not "pushed", you can click on
this to cause the current animation time to use an interpolated position rather than a
key-frame position.
will be in a
"pushed" state whenever the object you are animating is at a key-frame position.
If not "pushed", you can click on this to cause the current object's position to
become a fixed non-interpolated position.
will be in a
"pushed" state whenever the object you are animating is at a path origin, or
sub-path origin key-frame position. If not "pushed", you can click on this to
cause the current key-frame position to be the beginning of a sub-path.
copies the current
key-frame to one key-frame later in the animation. This is useful for adding pauses to
animations.
Alt-clicking on
will move the current
key-frame to one key-frame later in the animation. Right-clicking on
will give you the
option of selecting a time to copy or move the key-frame.
copies the current
key-frame to one key-frame earlier in the animation. This is useful for adding pauses to
animations.
Alt-clicking on will
move the current
key-frame to one key-frame earlier in the animation. Right-clicking on
will give you the
option of selecting a time to copy or move the key-frame.
creates a repeating
animation. All key-frames for the selected object will be repeated continuously. Note that
the key-frame for the current time will be set to equal the first key-frame in the
animation in order to create a continuos animation.