Presenting molecular structures to others can be a challenge, especially when static images fail to capture important spatial relationships and behavior. Whether you’re teaching, preparing a publication, or simply sharing a beautiful molecular system with your colleagues, clarity often lies in motion.
One useful and surprisingly overlooked way to enhance understanding is by adding subtle animations that draw attention to specific parts of your model without distracting from the overall structure. The Rock animation in SAMSON is a simple yet powerful tool for doing just that.
Why use the Rock animation?
The Rock animation creates a smooth back-and-forth movement of a selected group of atoms or molecules around their geometric center. This motion, which occurs along the Z-axis, helps viewers perceive the 3D shape of structures more easily. In many cases, rotating the whole model can be too much motion — rocking just part of it provides a gentle focus.
For example, if you’re displaying a binding pocket or a flexible domain within a larger biomolecule, highlighting it with a light rock movement helps the audience immediately spot it and better understand its spatial configuration.
How to apply the Rock animation in SAMSON
Applying the Rock animation is straightforward:
- Select a group of particles (atoms, residues, etc.) that you want to animate. You can use any particle selection tools you’re comfortable with in SAMSON. Learn more about selection tools here.
- Open the Animator and locate the Animation panel. This panel contains a library of animation effects.
- Double-click on the Rock effect. It will be added to the selected group between the initial and final keyframes.
- Adjust the keyframes as needed to control duration and timing. You can move them freely on the animation timeline to match your presentation goals.
Control and flexibility
The Rock animation supports easing curves, which let you fine-tune how the motion behaves between keyframes. Want a smoother, more organic rock? Try experimenting with different easing options such as ease-in, ease-out, or ease-in-out curves. These small adjustments can greatly improve the visual result depending on your particular use case.
Example in action
Here’s an illustrative example of how the Rock effect looks in SAMSON:
This animation was applied to a molecular domain to highlight movement without rotating the entire structure. You can see how it helps distinguish the selected area while keeping the rest of the structure stable.
Presentation-ready visualizations
If you’re preparing material for a class, giving a talk, or submitting a graphical abstract, adding this gentle animation may be just what’s needed to make your models more engaging and informative. It requires minimal setup and gives you precise control over what the audience focuses on.
To explore examples of molecular systems using this effect, check out this shared public document: 2BRD – Rock animation.
You can learn more about the Rock animation and its properties on the official documentation page: https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/animations/rock/.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.