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Creating Walkthroughs and Flythroughs

Creating Walkthroughs and Flythroughs
Learn how to create walkthroughs and flythroughs in AutoCAD 2018. Get quick and easy video tutorials on rendering and creating animations by AutoCAD experts.

In addition to creating rendered still images, you can create animated walkthroughs and flythroughs of your AutoCAD models. And there are actually several different tools you can use.

The tools for creating animations are located in the Animations panel on the Visualize ribbon. But by default, this panel is not initially visible, so you will need to turn it on. You can do this by right-clicking any panel in the ribbon, and choosing Show Panels > Animations.

The Animations panel contains a number of tools. First, look at the Walk and Fly tools, which are located in this split button. The Walk and Fly tools are quite similar. The only real difference is that when you use the Walk tool, the viewpoint of your animation only travels along the XY-plane, whereas when you use the Fly tool, this movement is not constrained to the XY-plane, so the viewpoint can utilize the Z-axis as well, and appear to fly over an area of the model.

Click to start the Walk tool. As soon as you do, the walk mode becomes activated in the current viewport and AutoCAD also displays a Position Locator palette. By default, this palette shows your position in the drawing from a top view.

You may also see a balloon near the top of the screen, in the InfoCenter area, with information about how to move around when using the Walk tool. It explains that you can use keys on the keyboard to move within the viewport. You can use the Up-Arrow or W key to move forward, the Left-Arrow or A key to move left, the Down-Arrow or S key to move backwards, and the Right-Arrow or D key to move to the right. You can also drag the mouse to change the direction in which you are looking, or use tools in the Position Locator palette itself.

You can also use the controls in the Walk and Fly Settings dialog to adjust the default walk and fly settings. For example, go back to the ribbon, expand the split button, and click Walk and Fly Settings. In the Walk and Fly Settings dialog, change the Walk/Fly step size to 18 units, which is approximately the distance a person moves with each step. Then, click OK to close this dialog.

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Then, start the Walk tool again. When you press and hold the Up-Arrow key on the keyboard, it appears as if you are walking forward into the model. If you click and drag the mouse, you can change the direction of the viewpoint, and then press the Up-Arrow key again to continue walking in that direction.

While walking into a model like this can be quite interesting, wouldn’t it be great if you could record your movements? Well, you can.

Press ESC to exit the Walk tool. Then, use the in-canvas view control to restore a named view called “Walk-Thru.” Then, start the Walk tool again. This time, before you begin to move into the model, notice that in the Animations panel, the Record Animation button has become active. When you click this button, AutoCAD begins to record all of your movement commands. Now, start moving through the model.

nce you have reached a stopping point, go back to the ribbon and click the Play button. The program opens an Animation Preview window and you immediately see the short animation that was recorded. As the animation is playing, you can even change the visual style.

If you are satisfied with the animation, you can save it to a file. With the Animation Preview window open, you can do this by clicking the Save button. Note that if you were to close the Animation Preview window, there is also a Save button in the Animations panel on the ribbon.

AutoCAD displays a Save As dialog. Navigate to the folder in which you want to save the animation and give the animation a name. Note that the only file type available in the Files of type drop-down is WMV Animation.

If you click the Animation settings… button, however, the program displays the Animation Settings dialog. Here, you have much more control over the resulting animation. For example, expand the Visual style drop-down. Here, not only can you choose any of the available visual styles, you can also choose Rendered, in which case AutoCAD will render each frame of the animation using the current render settings. In the Resolution drop-down, you can choose the resolution of the animation file. In the Format drop-down, you can choose the animation file type; you are no longer limited to just a WMV file. Select AVI. And in the Frame rate field, you can specify the number of frames per second to create in the finished animation. Just remember that if you render each frame of your animation and use the standard frame rate of 30 frames per second, it could take quite a while to produce the animation file.

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Rather than making you wait while all of those frames render, here is an example of a walkthrough animation created from this model, in which each frame was rendered.

You can also create a walkthrough or flythrough using the Animation Motion Path tool, which is also located in the Animations panel on the Visualize ribbon. This tool enables you to first define a path along which you want the camera to move, so that you can plan your movement in advance.

The exercise drawing (29_FLY_PATH.dwg) already includes a spline to use as the path for the camera. Click the Animation Motion Path tool. As soon as you do, AutoCAD displays the Motion Path Animation dialog. You can use the controls in this dialog to specify a point or path for the camera and target, as well as the frame rate, number of frames, duration of the animation, visual style, animation file format, and resolution.

For example, since you want the camera to move along the spline path, in the Camera group box, select the Path radio button and then click the adjacent button. The dialog temporarily disappears and the program prompts you to select the path. Click to select the spline. As soon as you do, a Path Name dialog appears so that you can give the path a name. In this case, simply click OK to accept the default path name.

In the Target group box, you could expand the drop-down and choose the same path for the target. But rather than have the camera simply look along the path as it moves, choose the Point radio button, click the adjacent button, and then pick a point about midway up the tower building. In the Point Name dialog, again simply click OK to accept the default target name.

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Next, in the Animation settings group box, click in the Duration field and change this value to 30, so that the resulting animation will be 30 seconds long. When you make that change, based on a Frame rate of 30 frames per second, the animation will contain 900 frames.

In the Visual style drop-down, you can choose any predefined visual style or choose render. Again, remember that if you render each of the 900 frames, it will take quite a while to complete your animation, so you might want to let this run overnight.

In the Resolution drop-down, you can choose the resolution of the resulting animation. And in the Format drop-down, you can select the desired video file format.

The Corner deceleration option will ensure that the camera moves a bit slower as it turns a corner. You can also reverse the direction of the animation.

If you click the Preview… button, AutoCAD opens an Animation Preview window so that you can see a preview of the resulting animation. Notice that you can change the visual style of the preview as it plays.

Once you are satisfied, you can close the preview window. In the Motion Path Animation dialog, click OK. The program displays a Save As dialog. Navigate to the folder in which you want to save the animation, give it a name, and click Save.

Again, remember that depending on the settings you selected, it could take many hours to compute and save your finished animation.

Rather than make you wait while that happens, here is what the finished animation looks like.

Source: Autodesk

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