Presets and Offsets

Presets for animation

The Select Preset Controllers dialog

You can create a Preset using any object in your scene (for example, a teapot or a text letter) and then you can;

• Apply a series of modifiers to it
• Animate transforms to it

Save the animation as a Preset and apply it to other geometry to produce the same behavior. Saving the animation as a Preset lets you reuse complex animations on multiple objects and control animation using timing controls offsets.

To create a Preset

Once you have an animation created using controllers that you want to reuse as a preset, follow these steps:
Note: You can only have one preset per object. If you try to load a preset on an object that already has a preset, a warning message appears.
1. With one or more object selected, select Animation > Presets > Create Preset to open the Select Preset Controllers dialog. For this example, a box with a noise controller is used.
   

   Box with a noise controller

2. In the Select Preset Controllers dialog, choose the controllers you want to use in your Preset and click OK.

   A new Preset Maker modifier appears in the modifier panel.

   Note: You can only have one preset per node.
3. Name the Preset and click the Save Preset button. In the example, the Preset was named "Earthquake".
   

   Preset Maker

   The Animation Preset is in your Project folder, under scene assets > animations > presets.
4. Select the object to which you want to apply the Preset, then choose Animation > Presets > Load Preset. In the example, a purple box is used.
   

   A purple box will receive the Earthquake preset

5. Select the Preset you created and load it.
6. The Preset animation is applied to the new object.
   

   Result: the controller animation on the blue box is saved as a Preset and applied to the purple box.

Create a preset, then select the controllers you want to offset, which will place a modifier on top. There are different filters (or ways) to show what you want. If animation has been done on the modifiers and transforms, you could easily show, for example, the ones that have animations on them.

See Editing Animation for more information about working with Local and World adjustment layers.

Once the controllers you want to have an offset are selected, a modifier will be added that allows you to name the preset and adjust the time controls that you want. You can also add custom attributes to that preset modifier. Once this is done, and the modifier saved, the preset can be applied to anything.

Presets allow you to create offset animations; for example, a balloon animation. If you wanted all your text to blow up like a balloon, you could use a smooth modifier, a relax modifier and a push modifier, and all those three modifiers would have the text blow up like a balloon.

You can build up a more complex set of instructions, save them, apply them as a preset, then apply the preset to other objects. You could then select each object and manipulate the controllers, such as time controllers and preset modifiers. For example, you can change the object's timing to be 5 frames instead of 10 frames, or, rather than the animation playing forward, to play backward

Presets can also be created without using offset controllers, allowing you to apply a complex setup instead of having to remake them every time.