Have you ever struggled to share the results of your molecular simulations or structural analyses in a way that truly captures the complexity of what you’re studying? Static images can be useful, but they often fall short when it comes to communicating dynamic interactions or conformational changes. That’s where SAMSON’s Animator comes in, offering a way to transform your work into clear, compelling visual stories.
Whether you’re preparing a conference talk, a class demo, or a video abstract, the Animator lets you create and export presentations directly inside SAMSON. Animations can bring your science to life, make your message clearer, and help others grasp the process or result you’re highlighting.
What is the Animator?
The Animator is a dedicated interface in SAMSON for building, editing, and rendering molecular animations. To open it, simply go to Interface > Animator or double-click on a presentation node in the Document view.
Key Components of the Animator
Here’s how the different parts of the Animator help you:
- Track View: A timeline-based editor showing all animations as tracks with color-coded keyframes. This is your animation storyboard.
- Controls: At the top, essential tools let you play, pause, define frame duration, and tweak playback behavior (loop, bounce, etc.).
- Animation Panel: Located on the right, this is where you choose animations to add to your scene—ranging from molecular motion to camera movement and more.
- Preview: Scroll through frames to interactively preview how your presentation looks before rendering.
Adding Visual Clarity
Animations help illustrate transitions like docking, conformational changes, or viewpoint shifts. For instance:
- Move Camera: Define a custom camera path to guide your viewer through the structure.
- Orbit Camera: Create a loop around your molecule to showcase its 3D geometry.
- Appear/Disappear Effects: Control when visual models show or fade out, helping focus attention.
Fine-tuning Your Animation
Most animations come with interactive controllers that appear in the viewport, giving you direct manipulation of camera orientation, movement paths, and keyframe positioning. While adjusting keyframes, thumbnails help you evaluate camera shots before finalizing them.
Editing and Playback
You can continuously refine your animation by dragging keyframes in the Track view, reordering animation blocks in the Document view, or editing parameters in the Inspector. Play the animation with spacebar or using the playback controls to see how it runs in real time.
Exporting Your Work
Once you’re happy with your creation, click the Save Movie button. You can export in MP4, GIF, or WebM formats and choose the number of frames, resolution, and framerate. Perfect for emails, slides, or social media.
Takeaway
The Animator in SAMSON is designed to make it simple and efficient for molecular modelers to go from structure to story. Whether it’s showing a protein binding pathway or revealing a complex nanostructure, animation helps your audience understand motion, interaction, and spatial arrangement in seconds.
To learn more and explore the full set of features, visit the official documentation: https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/presenting/
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.