When crafting molecular animations, timing plays a key role in ensuring your audience fully understands the processes being visualized. But sometimes, even the most carefully designed transitions go by too quickly, skipping right past a critical conformation or biological mechanism.
This is a common challenge faced by researchers and educators: how to make a specific moment last longer in a complex molecular presentation? Whether you’re showing an enzyme active site in action or highlighting a ligand’s docking pose, you may often wish you could simply freeze everything just long enough to let the moment sink in.
That’s where the Pause animation in SAMSON becomes particularly useful.
Why Use a Pause?
A well-placed pause adds clarity. It gives your viewers time to observe structural changes, reflect on a molecular interaction, or take screenshots for further analysis. This is especially important in scientific communication and teaching, where many visual cues are packed into a few seconds of motion.
How to Add a Pause in SAMSON
Integrating a pause effect into your animation sequence is simple:
- Open the Animation panel in the Animator.
- Double-click on the Pause animation to insert it at the current frame.
- You can always drag and reposition the keyframe on the timeline to where it makes the most impact.
Note
You can always move the keyframes of the animation.
Customizing the Duration
By default, the pause duration may be too short or too long depending on your intentions. To fine-tune this value:
- Select the Pause animation node in the Document view.
- Use the Inspector to set the desired duration in seconds.
This flexibility allows you to control exactly how long the animation holds on a specific frame. For example, you might want to pause longer when the molecule reaches a transition state or when a label or annotation appears.
Practical Use Cases
Based on real-world experiences from molecular designers, here are a few impactful ways to utilize the Pause effect in SAMSON:
- Highlighting Binding Sites: Freeze the animation as a ligand enters the active site to illustrate key interactions.
- Educational Videos: Insert pauses during transitions between molecular states to prompt discussion or comprehension checks.
- Data Presentation: Pause before or after a mechanism step to allow time for voice-over explanations.
The next time you’re working on a molecular video and want your audience to slow down and think, consider placing a well-timed pause—sometimes a few seconds is all it takes to turn confusion into clarity.
To learn more about the Pause animation in SAMSON, visit the official documentation page.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.