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Motion Trail

Contents

  1. 1 Download
  2. 2 Introduction
  3. 3 How to use
  4. 4 Beta-testers
  5. 5 More information

Download

You can download the Add-On (version 3.1.1) here: <python file>

Not certain what to do with this file? Read the information on installing Add-Ons.
In the Add-Ons panel it will show up as Animation: Motion Trail.

If you liked this script, please consider making a donation.

Introduction

The video below shows how to use Motion Trail 3 and what you can do with it. Watch it at fullscreen in HD for the details.

A video of Motion Trail 2, showing some of the basic functionality can be seen here.

How to use

The add-on uses the same hotkeys as the ones used at other places in Blender. By default this means the right-mouse button to select and G-key to move. Press the left-mouse button to confirm the movement or Escape-key to cancel. If you have changed your settings (e.g. left-mouse selection instead of right-mouse), the add-on will notice the changes and use your custom user preferences.

There are 3 modes in the add-on: Location, Speed and Timing.
  • Location: select a keyframe or handle and move it to change the location data of the object's animation path. Moving a frame automatically inserts a keyframe at that position.
  • Speed: select and move a timebead to change the speed-in or speed-out of the associated keyframe.
  • Timing: select and move a single keyframe to change the location of that keyframe on the timeline. Selecting and dragging a timebead moves all keyframes (except from the first and last one) on the timeline.
The Speed and Timing mode don't change the location of the object , only the speed. This holds true as long as the handles in the graph-editor don't overlap.

The motion trail can display different colours. Most interesting are the speed and acceleration gradients.
Speed: blue is slow, red is fast
Acceleration: green is positive, yellow is no acceleration, red is negative acceleration.
Note: the colours are relative. So each is speed gradient contains both 100% blue and 100% red.
Warning: At the start and end frames the gradients might be slightly off.

Beta-testers

Special thanks go to the following people for helping me to test Motion Trail 3.

Joe Daniels (artofjoe.blogspot.com)
Wayne Dixon (waynedixon.com.au)
Gottfried Hoffman (blenderdiplom.com)
Daniel Martinez Lara (pepeland.com)
Ben Unguren (mostlydocumentary.com)

More information

There is a support thread for this script on BlenderArtists.
Bug tracker and wiki page.