Explore the Walkthrough function on SOLIDWORKS Visualize.
SOLIDWORKS Visualize Why Go Pro? 3- Walkthroughs
The Walk-through function of Visualize Professional is a special type of
animation where you simply move the camera and explore your design in 3D. You
can control your travel
using just your mouse or keyboard controls, move randomly along the floor, ground, or surface,
fly around your
design to get an aerial view and export the results to a video to share with others whether
it be to your manager, client or for an exhibition.
Step 1:
Prepare your files
within SOLIDWORKS. As with all models it is easier to apply simple materials to
your bodies before taking it in to Visualize. At this point try to think what
you actually want to show with this model. Delete any pointless bodies or
geometry that are not needed or will not be seen.
Step 2:
Import into Visualize. Often it is a good idea to untick environments as
Visualize environments are often more advanced. Remember to select the
appropriate ‘Part grouping’.
Step 3:
Turn on ‘Use ALT + SHIFT for Walking Camera Navigation’. This can be found in
Tools > Options > User Interface. This is what we are going to use to
move around the model.
Step 4:
Set your rendering quality to fast and apply your material
appearances, scenes etc.
Step 5:
Show the timeline by going View > Show timeline OR CNTL + L. Drag the red
flag (showing the end of the animation) out to your desired time for your
animation.
Step 6:
Go
to your camera tab and copy a new camera by right clicking an existing camera,
selecting Copy and then right clicking again in the camera tab and selecting
paste. (It is always best to have more than more camera for Walk-through’s
as one will be moving and the other can see where this camera is).
Position
this camera where you want to start your walk-through. Set, from the camera tab
with the new camera selected, an appropriate focal length (example 35 mm) and
an appropriate height from floor (for example 1.8 meters for the average eye
height).
Step 7:
Make sure you’re at 0 seconds on the timeline (the yellow flag) and right click
your new camera and add a key-frame.
Step 8:
Ensure Auto Key-framing is turned on by making sure the stop watch icon is red.
This way when you turn your camera in a new time frame a key will be added to
the timeline automatically reflecting the new orientation.
Step 9:
Move your timeline to a set increment (for
example 2 seconds) by dragging the yellow flag. Next use SHIFT + ALT + LFT
Mouse Button to move around to your next point of focus. This will add a key in
to your
timeline. Ensure the camera that you want has a red dot in the top left corner
to ensure that a walk-through animation is being created.
Step 10:
Apply the same process by moving
to the next time scale and adding more views in by using SHIFT + ALT + LFT
Mouse button. Remember to ensure your camera isn’t going up and down when it
isn’t meant to be by ensuring your ‘Height from floor’ in the camera tab stays
the same at each Key-frame.
Step 11:
So you have now created your walk through but
you want to view and edit your path? This can be done using the ‘ribbon’. To
see this we need to change the rendering setting to ‘preview’ and change from
your walk-through camera to a free camera (double click on the free camera).
In
your timeline ensure the backwards S is coloured. If it is greyed out, simply
left click on it to turn it on. You can either show all ribbons or hide ribbons
or hide and show individual ribbons created using different cameras.
Step 12:
When you can see your ribbon you can use it to edit your
path. Each key-frame has a box. If you select each box you can use the ‘move’
tools to bring up a triad. The red, green and blue arrows control where the box
is and the white arrow and the rotating rings control where the camera is
looking.
Step 13:
Once happy with your
walk-through you can then output a movie by going to the render tab at the top
and choosing animation. When exporting animations there are two different tabs
to go through, the ‘animation options’ and the ‘render options’. If you want to
create a movie or your walkthrough, just make sure to select ‘create movie’ in
the animation options tab.
You can see the other blogs in this series on Visualize Professional below;
Visualize Why Go Pro? 1-Configurations
Visualize Why Go Pro? 2-Render Queuing
Chris Green
Applications Engineer