Creating molecular animations can be a powerful way to communicate complex structural transitions, conformational changes, or step-by-step molecular mechanisms. However, when presenting these animations, it’s often necessary to slow down or emphasize a particular moment in the animation. For instance, you might want to linger on a critical binding event or highlight a molecular movement before continuing.
This is where the Pause animation in SAMSON becomes particularly useful. It allows molecular modelers to hold a specific frame for a given duration, making complex visualizations easier to digest and improving overall presentation clarity.
Why use a pause in molecular animations?
If you’re putting together a presentation or a teaching video with animations, timing can be crucial. When too many structural changes happen rapidly, your audience may get lost. The Pause animation acts as a visual break by freezing the scene at key points. It gives the viewer time to interpret what they are seeing before moving on to the next sequence.
Imagine explaining protein-ligand docking and wanting to pause on the exact frame when the ligand enters the active site — a Pause lets your viewer absorb that moment.
How to insert a Pause in SAMSON
Inserting a Pause is straightforward. First, open the Animation panel in the Animator. Then, simply double-click on the Pause effect. The Pause will be inserted at the current frame, and you can later drag it elsewhere on the timeline.
Note: You can always reposition the Pause keyframe wherever it makes most sense in your animation sequence.
Setting the duration of the pause
Once you’ve inserted the Pause, select it in the Document view, and use the Inspector to define for how long you’d like the animation to be paused, in seconds.
This level of control allows high precision — perfect for tailoring your molecular story to your audience’s attention span and understanding level.
Where and when to pause: Tips for better animations
- Start or end of an event: Pause right before or after an important transition to give viewers time to absorb the event.
- Highlighting regions of interest: Freeze frames where you annotate key residues or structural features.
- Before switching camera angles: Provide a mental reset point before dynamic changes in viewpoint.
Pausing at key steps increases the educational value of your animations and makes them more engaging — especially in classroom settings or when preparing outreach material.
Use this feature wisely to guide your audience through the molecular story you’re trying to tell.
To learn more, visit the original documentation page for the Pause animation.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. You can get SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.