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1999 Spring Quarter

The animator project is basically an extended version of the modeler project you worked on for project 2. There are a few new extensions that are worth paying attention to:

• Write Raytrace File - There is a new menu option that allows you to write a raytrace file. More information is available here.
  
  
• Curve mode - From the "Edit" menu, there are options that allow you to choose between two modes - Control Mode and Curve Mode.
  
  Control Mode is essentially the same as in the original modeler project. All of the variable parameters in your model appear as sliders or checkboxes.
  
  Curve mode is a new mode that allows you to animate most of the controls (that were placed in control mode) along curved paths. There are a few limitations in animating non-slider controls (like checkboxes, etc) - you basically can't. In order to change the values of these types of elements, you have to create a real-valued curve and then test its value, (e.g., call a positive value "true" and a negative value "false", instead of calling get_control_b()).
  
  
• Use Curves - From the "Animate" menu, there is a checked menu option called "Use Curves". Checking this option allows the user to view the animation using the created motion paths.
  
  
• Animation Variables - In Curve Mode, there is a button named "Animation Variables", located at the base of the window. This button allows you to choose which animation variable's path curve you are currently editing.
  
  
• Curve Settings - In Curve Mode, there is a button named "Curve Settings", located at the base of the window. This button allows you to choose which type of curve you are currently using for the specified animation variable.
  
  
• Set y range - In Curve Mode, there is a button named "Set y range", located at the base of the window. This button brings up a dialog box which allows you to edit the y-range of the specified animation variable. The box it brings up has two main buttons: Rescale (re-scale the curve to the new range) and Clamp (view more of the y-axis while keeping the curve at the same y-values).
  
  
• Global Parameters - In Curve Mode, there is a button named "Global Parameters", located at the base of the window. This button brings up a dialog box which allows you to edit parameters pertaining to the overall animation. The box it brings up has two main buttons: Rescale (re-scale all the curves to a new time range) and Clip (cut or extend the curves to the new time length without modifying any values). There is also a checkbox Wrap Around which forces the curves to have the same value and tangent at the first and last point. This feature makes it possible to have continuously loopin animations.
  
  
• Curve window - You can add points to the curve window by simply right-clicking in the window. You can move points by placing the mouse over the point, clicking and then dragging. You can remove points by holding the [CTRL] key while clicking on a point.