Animating Objects in Your Movie

Back to Creating, Editing, and Rendering Animations.

Overview of Object Animation
Animation, like movies, is rapidly sequencing a series of images that when viewed, creates the illusion of movement.

Characteristics of your scene that can be animated are called properties. And nearly everything in Carrara is a property! Here are some common examples in animation.


 * Moving cameras, lights, and objects
 * Changing the shape, size, angle, and shading of objects
 * Adjusting lighting parameters, such as color, brightness, falloff, and
 * Altering background and atmospheric effects

Methods of Object Animation
Carrara supports a number of different kinds of animation, each of which works differently.
 * Use the Keyframe Animation method to explicitly change an object's properties (e.g., position, size, and shader)
 * Use the Motion Path Animation method to explicit define a path that an object is to take.
 * Use the Physics Animation method when you want your objects to follow realistic laws of physics.
 * Use the Animation Group method to create animation loops and repeater sequences

Tips and Techniques on Object Animation

 * Since animation type is connected to objects, then you can combine these different types. However, you will not be able to mix animation methods for a specific object. For example, if you use physics as the method to define an object's path, you cannot also use the motion path or keyframe methods.


 * The object "Track" modifier is another form of animation, as it instructs an object to follow another object that is being manipulated by animation.


 * The character Puppeteer feature is another way to animate objects. This is covered separately in the wiki section called Working With Characters.
 * Some objects (e.g., characters like Genesis) come with predefined morphs that you can use to transform your objects in an animation.

More on How to Animate Objects
Daz3D Documentation Support

Carrara 7 User's Guide - pp. 651 - 732.

Carrara 8 User's Guide - pp. xx - xx.