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dcr222
dcr222
Participant
March 7, 2018
Answered

Drawing and animating a spring

  • March 7, 2018
  • 1 reply
  • 788 views

I need to animate a spring compressing or stretching.  I need to be able to show the spring decelerating as it compresses or accelerating as it relaxes.  My problem is that I don't see any tutorials on drawing springs in Animate or Illustrator.  I've already drawn springs in SketchUp but I don't see how to important them into animate in a form I can animate.  Thanks in advance for your help.

    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Correct answer Colin Holgate

    I answered your post in the SketchUp forum, which is that you can export DXF, open those in Illustrator, and copy/paste them into Animate.

    Generally speaking Animate is for 2D graphics, so you're going to be looking at a side on view of the spring, it won't really be 3D.

    Another possibility is to export as Collada, then make a new 3D layer from that file in Photoshop. You can then scale the Z axis to squish the spring. But, it will make the spring seem thinner, and not just compressed.

    1 reply

    Colin Holgate
    Colin HolgateCorrect answer
    Inspiring
    March 7, 2018

    I answered your post in the SketchUp forum, which is that you can export DXF, open those in Illustrator, and copy/paste them into Animate.

    Generally speaking Animate is for 2D graphics, so you're going to be looking at a side on view of the spring, it won't really be 3D.

    Another possibility is to export as Collada, then make a new 3D layer from that file in Photoshop. You can then scale the Z axis to squish the spring. But, it will make the spring seem thinner, and not just compressed.

    dcr222
    dcr222Author
    Participant
    March 7, 2018

    Thanks much Colin.

    Do you think I'd be able to tween the images in Animate?  That way I would avoid making the spring seem thinner.

    Do you know of any 3d animation programs I can use with a bit less of a learning curve than Maya or Blender? 

    Colin Holgate
    Colin Holgate
    Inspiring
    March 8, 2018

    I see the SketchUp conversation progressed. They seem to have covered a lot of options. I'm trying to see if there are spring add ons in Unity, but can't see one yet. There's plenty of physics, but that doesn't involve compressing geometry.

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