Making an Animation to View ?

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Fletcher
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Making an Animation to View ?

Post by Fletcher »

Hi ..

This request for help is probably directed to the more technically competent amongst us, or at least experienced. I know off hand that at least MrV and ME do this regularly.

I use WM2D quite a lot when I'm investigating something mechanical. I sometimes post up screen grabs loaded into Paint (jpeg or png) or IrfanView (gif), usually of the setup, and start and finish Inputs and Outputs etc.

Some of you are able to post up Animations of your WM files in action. I have no clue how to do this and would like to learn as its a superior way to present dynamic information for review.

Can someone give me some step by step pointers for dummies ? Thanks in advance !
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ME
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Post by ME »

My method is perhaps not the simplest, but it works for me.

I time a good starting point and a full rotation (or repetition).

Then for each time-step I take a manual screenshot (alt-prtSc);
Followed by a paste-as-layer to my old and trusty (now be shocked!!) Paintshop Pro- version 5 (some free magazine version) since ahum... 1995.. but using just 10M of memory - always open, no update agents or "services".
Then go back to wm2d and step to the next timestamp (if it's too much I'll launch a macro with something like: WM.ActiveDocument.Run 500)
I repeat this for the needed amount of frames: 24 or 32

I save that Image-file, with layers and all, Run the animation-shop (part of that program); adjust some settings and save.

- - - - - - - -
So I guess that's not really helpfull.

A never used option:

There is a menu:>File>Export [exporttype=Video for windows .avi]
Set the frame boundaries, +options and go
Then you only need a convertor from avi to gif.
Marchello E.
-- May the force lift you up. In case it doesn't, try something else.---
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jim_mich
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Post by jim_mich »

I make simple animated gif's using a very old program called Microsoft Gif Animator. Using paint or screen captures or any other programs, I make a series of pictures or images. I store each one as a gif file, labeled sequentially in a new folder, starting with P1.gif. Then while the folder it open on my screen, I open the Gif Animator program. Using Gif animator, I open the first P1.gif picture. (With older computers you could drag and drop the first image, but the newer computers don't work the same.) I then drag and drop the other pictures one by one into the Gif animator program. It’s designed to do this. I then set some parameters as to how long each image should be displayed and if it should repeat. I preview how it runs. Then I do a save-as, usually to P0.gif.

Yes, this is rather time consuming, but it works.

PS. Saving gif images from paint program pixelates the pictures, making them much bigger files. I often save paint pictures as png files. Then I run a clone of my old HP computer that has a very good image handling program. (The 32 bit program won't run in my newer 64 bit machine) I convert the png pictures to pure gif pictures. Then I run the pure gif picture thru the gif animator.

I must assume this is all too complex, and that you are looking for some fancy program that does all the work for you?

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Post by Silvertiger »

Fletcher, just download Microsoft Expression Encoder 4 Screen Capture. It's the easiest thing in the world to use and doesn't cost anything. It's what I use.
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Post by ME »

Although Silvertiger has a good tip to capture what you did (multi-purpose !), or show some sequence - I still don't recommend it.

As it may seem the old-school method is laborious, there are benefits.
- While copying, you'll pay extra attention to each frame in detail - even sub-consciously*;
- By adjusting the delay time of some frames, you can show some frames at a very low frame-rate (thus a small system footprint);
- As starting a movie takes away some attention, you'll most of the time miss the first few frames, therefore an auto-repeat Gif gives a better feel of continuity and the motion it displays;
- The animation can run continuously on screen while doing something else (still not taking much resources), giving it a change to get noticed under different circumstances.

This is how and why I use gif-ani's
Sometimes old-school rocks !

A quick-search which looks good: http://listoffreeware.com/list-of-best- ... -software/

(edit: *I wrote "unconsciously" - that would make a bad animation)
Marchello E.
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Fletcher
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re: Making an Animation to View ?

Post by Fletcher »

Thanks guys .. I thought I'd leave it and think about it a bit.

Then I remembered the "Export" option in the "File" drop box menu (I think ME mentioned it).

So I had a little play.

You can either run a sim (not saved) or run a sim and then save it.

Then Export the file. Select it as an .avi file for Windows.

I have VLC media player so I was then able to open VLC and select the saved .avi file and run the animation. All I need to do is post as an attachment the .avi file. You beauty !

So simple when you know how ;7)

P.S. you have to click the little green arrow (top left corner) to run the animation of the sim it seems.
Attachments
Untitled1.avi
animation
(232 KiB) Downloaded 3792 times
Untitled2.avi
Animation (not Saved)
(221.5 KiB) Downloaded 3785 times
rlortie
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re: Making an Animation to View ?

Post by rlortie »

Do not know anything about it, but here is a link to a website promoting a new SimScale.

https://www.simscale.com/?utm_source=Di ... fgodnBEHxg

Ralph
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