Linking Animations to Timeliner tasks

A quick Monday morning update. One of the most powerful ways to use Navisworks is to use features in conjunction with each other. Time-based clashing, search sets and the appearance profiler and linking animations to Timeliner. There's a long list of ways and reasons why you might want to link an object or set of objects in a Timeliner task to an Animation, opening doors at the right time, moving panels for a snazzy animation, rotating a crane into position amongst others.

Here's how you do it.

1. Create an animation using Animator, an object moving, rotating, changing scale or a combination of these.
2. In the Tasks tab in Timeliner, change the Column Set to Extended, this will make all the Advanced columns available.



3. Select an Animator Scene/Animation in the Animation column to link the object to.
4. In Animation behaviour, decide whether you want to 'Scale' the Animation to the length of the Task, 'Match Start' to the beginning of the task, or 'Match End' of the task. Just remember how long your animation is in comparison to the task, Animation default units is seconds, Timeliner can be days or weeks, meaning you might want to scale it to the length of the task.



5. Easy as that, we'll talk about some ways in which you might want to use this feature over the next few weeks.

We welcome any feedback on how you use this, or questions about why you would use this, just use the links in the left column to contact us.

Comments

[Li Jiang]

I created an animation of moving columns from bottom to top and linked to the timeline. But when I simulate the model, none animation effects shown. I really don't know what causes this problem.

[Lee Mullin]

Unfortunately it's not currently possible, I've asked and it's not available in the API either. Can you email us using the 'Suggest a Topic' above with details about how you would see this working, what your workflow is, and any simple datasets that demonstrate the issue. I'll pass this onto product management.

Thanks

Lee

[Christopher Baze]

Is there a way to automate the linking of similarly named animation sets and timeliner tasks like you can with search sets and timeliner tasks?

[Kevin]

Looking for a further indepth session on animations in timeliner check out my session from Autodesk University 2009 - Navisworks Bringing your Construction Schedule to Life.

You will need a login for Autodesk University to View.
http://au.autodesk.com/?nd=class&session_id=5204

[Lee Mullin]

Hi Kalpana,

It depends what you are trying to do. You need to make sure that you still have the tasks constructing and appearing during the timeline.

I'd suggest if you are having problems that you post on the forums with more detail as you'll get a better answer there.
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Autodesk-Navisworks/bd-p/372

[Kalpana]

I loved this particular topic. Could you please add on to this? I have been trying to add an animation to timeliner.Before adding the animation, the simulation works fine. Once I add animation to a particular task, the screen goes blank during simulation.

Thanks
Kalpana