If you’ve ever spent hours perfecting a molecular animation or presentation in SAMSON, then you know how important it is to be able to share your work with your colleagues, your class, or your audience. But what’s the easiest way to go from your animation timeline to an actual video file you can share or embed anywhere?
Thankfully, SAMSON provides an intuitive way to export your work to movie files like MP4, GIF, or WebM formats — perfect for emails, presentations, social media, or institutional websites.
Why exporting matters 🧬🎥
You might have created a compelling molecular docking animation or simulated a protein assembly. But sharing a live SAMSON project isn’t always practical, especially when your recipients don’t have the software installed. Exporting animations as movies lets you:
- Embed animations into research papers and lectures
- Create educational content for students
- Share findings on social media or YouTube
- Archive visual evidence of molecular dynamics
How to export a presentation to a movie in SAMSON
1. First, make sure you’ve created or opened a presentation in the Animator. Double-click the Presentation node in the Document view to bring it into focus.
2. Click on the Save movie button located in the top-right corner of the Animator interface.
3. In the Save As dialog, choose the output format you prefer:
- MP4: great for high-quality videos and general sharing
- GIF: quick loops for presentations or web integration
- WebM: modern, compressed video format for browsers
4. Select the destination folder and filename. Click Save.
5. SAMSON will automatically render your animation into a video, using your current presentation settings.
Customize before export
Before exporting, you can adjust global presentation preferences by clicking the gear icon in the Animator interface:
- Frame rate and resolution
- Whether to show or hide animation controllers
- Watermark settings (depending on your SAMSON plan)
- Start and end frames, background colors or images
Want to include customized backgrounds, such as slides or a laboratory logo? Use the Set background animation from the Animation panel. This gives your final movie a polished, contextual appearance.
Best practices for exporting animations
- Use Hold camera animations to ensure view stability where needed
- Test the timeline by playing the animation in the Animator before exporting
- Use easing curves and keyframes to smoothly transition between views
Example use case
Let’s say you’ve built an animation that assembles a protein complex while orbiting the camera to reveal binding sites. By combining Assemble + Orbit camera + Appear animations in a 180-frame presentation, you can visually explain complex molecular events in a matter of seconds. Exporting this as a movie means that any collaborator—or student—can repeat the experience on any screen, no installation needed.
Exporting a presentation to a movie lets your molecular stories travel far — from lecture halls to Twitter threads.
🧪 Learn more about creating and exporting presentations in SAMSON in the official documentation.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.