When designing molecular animations, it’s often not enough to just make things move — you want to be able to capture that motion for playback, export, or deeper analysis. If you’ve ever struggled to precisely reconstruct an animation sequence or needed a reliable way to preserve atom movement data, you’re not alone. That’s where the Record path feature in SAMSON comes in handy.
This animation effect captures atomic positions over time and stores them as a path. Rather than manually tracing where atoms go during an animation, Record path does the work for you, recording trajectories automatically as the animation plays.
Why record a path?
Molecular modelers often need to:
- Analyze how a ligand docks into a protein or moves through a channel
- Create educational or presentation material showing molecular motion
- Use trajectories as baselines for simulations or new configurations
Record path lets you save time and preserve the integrity of your workflow by transforming animations into reproducible, navigable paths.
How to add the Record Path animation
In the Animation panel of the Animator, double-click on Record path. This adds a new animation keyframe to your sequence.
The animation uses color coding within the timeline to let you know if atomic positions have been recorded:
- ✅ Green: Positions recorded correctly
- ❌ Red: Not yet recorded or data is invalid
Best practices for accurate path recording
- The Record path animation should be placed after the animation effects that move atoms. SAMSON plays animations from top to bottom.
- You can move keyframes to adjust timing if needed.
- You can disable path recording temporarily to improve performance — especially useful while editing animations.
- You’ll find an Enable Recording toggle in the animation’s Inspector panel or by right-clicking the animation label.
Exporting the recorded path
Once the animation has been played and the entire timeline is green, the trajectory is ready to be exported as a standalone Path node.
You can create this path in two ways:
- Click Create path in the Inspector of the animation
- Right-click the animation in the Animator and select Create path
This converts the positional data into a reusable and inspectable path object that can be further visualized, analyzed, or shared.
When is this especially useful?
🎓 Educational content creators can show real molecular dynamics procedures step by step.
🧬 Researchers can generate trajectory data to compare before and after states of molecular events.
💼 Teams collaborating on visualization projects or grant applications can ensure consistency in animations.
To learn more and explore advanced configurations, visit the full documentation page here: https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/animations/record-path/
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.