Creating compelling and clear scientific visuals can be a challenge for molecular modelers. Whether you’re preparing a presentation, sharing your latest findings, or teaching students about molecular structures, you want your audience to understand the spatial arrangement of atoms—without needing a chemistry degree.
This is where dynamic molecular animations come into play, and one particularly helpful SAMSON feature is the Rock animation. It allows you to gently rock a group of particles around their geometric center along the Z-axis. This subtle back-and-forth movement creates a parallax effect that makes it easier to perceive the 3D structure of the molecule. It’s especially useful when rotating a structure 360° is excessive or distracting.
Why Use the Rock Animation?
Imagine you’re showing a ribbon structure of a protein in a presentation. Static images might flatten depth, and full rotations can be too fast or disorienting. The Rock animation strikes a sweet spot by providing motion without losing focus. It enhances depth perception using a simple and controlled motion. This makes it perfect not only for presentations, but also for instructional videos or dynamic posters.
How It Works
The Rock animation rotates the selected atoms or molecular group back and forth around their centroid, aligned with the Z-axis of the view. The visual effect is that the structure appears to gently swing toward and away from the viewer. All you need is to:
- Select the group of particles you want to animate.
- Double-click the Rock animation in the Animation panel within the Animator.
- Adjust the keyframes to control when the rocking starts and ends.
Customize the Feeling
Want to make the rock motion feel softer or more abrupt? You can fine-tune how the rotation interpolates over time using the Easing curve feature. This lets you define whether the object eases in or out of the motion, or maintains a steady speed throughout.
When to Use This Animation
- To emphasize specific binding sites on a macromolecule
- To highlight structural asymmetry in a symmetrical-looking assembly
- To avoid overwhelming viewers with constant 3D rotations
- To create loopable, low-distraction animations for web or poster displays
For an example of the Rock animation applied in a real molecular system, have a look at this 2BRD presentation on SAMSON Connect.
Learn more about the Rock animation in the SAMSON documentation.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can get SAMSON at www.samson-connect.net.