When creating molecular animations, sometimes the hardest part is not setting complex motions or transitions — it’s making the presentation feel right for your audience. A well-placed pause can make all the difference: it gives your viewers time to focus, absorb, and reflect on what they see before moving to the next point. In SAMSON, the molecular design platform, this becomes easy to implement thanks to the Pause animation.
Why do molecular modelers need pauses?
If you’ve ever built an animation to present a molecular interaction or a structural rearrangement, you might have experienced this issue: the action moves too fast. Important snapshots — a key hydrogen bond forming, a domain opening, a drug binding — all come and go too quickly. Viewers are left asking, “Wait, what happened?”
That’s where the Pause animation comes in. It lets you stop the animation at a specific frame for a given number of seconds, giving critical insights more time to resonate. This can be particularly useful during presentations, poster video loops, or teaching materials where timing clarity matters more than animation complexity.
How to add a pause
Adding a pause to your animation sequence in SAMSON only takes a few clicks:
- Open the Animation panel in the Animator.
- Double-click on the Pause animation effect.
- A keyframe will be inserted at your current position on the timeline. You can move it anywhere you need the pause.
Note
You can always move keyframes around to fine-tune the timing of your animation.
Customizing pause duration
Once the Pause animation is added, you can set its duration using the Inspector:
- Select the Pause animation node in the Document view.
- In the Inspector, specify how long you want that frame to be held — for example, 2 seconds, 5 seconds, etc.
This allows you to control exactly how long your audience spends on each part of your animation sequence. Whether you’re showcasing an enzymatic mechanism or walking viewers through a step-by-step assembly of a molecular complex, the pacing becomes flexible and intentional.
Visual example
Here’s an example of how things look in the Inspector when you edit the Pause duration:
Wrapping up
The Pause animation in SAMSON might be a small feature, but it’s a powerful tool for improving how your molecular animations are understood. It offers control over timing, enhances clarity, and allows you to direct your audience’s focus where it matters most.
It only takes seconds to insert — and it just might help viewers not miss seconds that matter.
Learn more in the official documentation.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can get SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.