When building molecular animations or presentations, a common challenge is to visually track how atoms move over time. While SAMSON offers multiple ways to manipulate atomic positions — such as through simulation, docking, or manual movement — visualizing and saving the path taken by atoms can help molecular modelers and educators better communicate the results.
This is where the Record path animation comes in handy. It lets you record atom trajectories over the course of an animation by adding a track that stores atomic positions frame-by-frame.
Why this matters
Whether you’re demonstrating a molecular mechanism, visualizing a simulation output, or preparing a class lecture, knowing exactly where atoms went — and being able to share that visually — can be invaluable. Without the ability to record the path, you might need to explain complex movements while your visual just isn’t showing enough detail.
With the Record path animation, you can not only remember and replay atomic movements, but also export those paths to use as data or visual elements later on.
How to use the Record path animation
To use this feature, just double-click on the Record path animation effect found in the Animation panel of the Animator. A keyframe will be inserted at the current frame — you can move it later if necessary.
The animation track will show different colored segments to indicate recording status:
- Green: atom positions have been recorded
- Red: positions not recorded or invalid
Tips for better usage
A few practical tips can help you get the most out of this animation:
- The Animator executes animations from top to bottom. Make sure to place the Record path below other animations that move atoms, so that movements are recorded after they happen.
- You can right-click on the animation and toggle Enable recording — useful if you want to pause recording to conserve resources.
- Darkened controllers signal that path recording is disabled.
Exporting the recorded path
Once you’ve played the animation and the path is fully recorded (in green), you can extract it as a Path node. There are two ways to do this:
- In the Inspector, click Create path
- Or right-click the Record path animation in the Animator and select Create path
This adds a separate node to your document representing the trajectory of the atoms, which you can use for visualization or further analysis.
Conclusion
The Record path animation provides a straight-forward way to capture and reuse molecular motions. Whether you’re presenting molecular dynamics, demonstrating mechanical processes, or archiving the movement of atoms for analysis, it’s a small feature that solves a practical recurring problem.
To learn more, visit the official documentation page.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can get SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.