- [Instructor] Another method to
generate SolidWorks Animations is to use,
what we call, motion drivers to drive the animations.
Specifically using mates
to control and drive these animations.
Using motion drivers, such as mates,
can be a great option for generating animations
that you want to have more fine control over.
For example, we saw using the click and drag method,
we could rotate an object say about 45 degrees or so.
But, by actually driving the mates,
we can make it exactly 45 degrees or have more exact values.
Using these motion controllers,
we have a lot more precision over our animations.
And the two types of mates that we'll be using most often,
with motion controllers and mate controllers,
are the distance mates and the angle mates
as they can hold exact dimension values
for translation or rotation.
So, a good example of this would be
this robotic arm assembly here,
as we have a bunch of different links
that we might want to control mating angles of.
So, what I can do, I can navigate over to my motion manager.
Again, scroll down until we find our mates folder.
I can expand my mates and I have a number of mates here.
But down in the bottom I have a number of my angle mates.
That's kind of for the degrees of rotation
available between each link.
So if we see angle one, looks like it would be
the rotation of my base component, so the first link.
Angle two would then be from that link to the next.
Angle three, from the third link to the fourth and so on.
We can drive these by changing
the specific angles within these angle mates.
So let's take a look at a fairly simple example here.
Maybe I'll start with angle two
and what I'm going to do, I'm going to just try to
rotate my second link there or
this link here, let's say about 45 degrees.
So, let's jump into this angle mate, add to zero seconds.
We're going to have them all
kind of in this vertical upright position.
And then, as usual, I'll just move my time bar to our right,
let's say zero to two seconds.
I'd like to make a change to this angle two.
So we're going to just right click and edit dimension,
just as we've seen before.
And change that to whatever angle I may like.
So let's change from zero degrees to say 45 degrees.
Green check.
Hence we should see at, for at two seconds here,
I should be changing to 45 degrees.
So let's try calculating or playing through.
And we can see exactly how that's playing out.
So I have my initial mating angle
which is zero degrees or straight up,
and then from zero to two seconds that angle mate
is changing to 45 degrees.
We can do a similar thing for any other angle mate.
Let's say angle three, so I want my next link here
to rotate as well.
It's important to set these start times and the stop times.
So let's say I wanted to rotate it 45 degrees,
from two to four seconds.
So if I just move my time bar to four seconds here,
and then made an edit to this dimension and said 45 degrees.
It's important to note that then I would be rotating
from my initial point which is at zero seconds,
so it'd be rotated from zero
to four seconds that 45 degrees.
Which is maybe what I want, and I would define as well,
but let's say instead I want first my angle two to rotate
from zero to two seconds,
and then my angle three to rotate from two to four seconds.
So what I have to do there is also set the initial point.
So one way I could do that is just go two seconds,
and again set this, place another key here for example,
or I could do a copy of an existing key.
So I could just click and drag an existing key
while holding down the control button,
and that makes a copy here.
As well you could right click and do a copy paste,
you have a whole bunch of options there,
but essentially we just need to set this initial point,
which would still be the zero,
so I'm starting in two seconds.
Then move ahead to say four seconds.
And now I'll make that change.
So angle three again, I can do a right click,
add a dimension, and maybe say here 45 degrees,
and the green check.
So we should be able to see these change bars,
and that should make sense to us now,
so zero to two there's a change,
then from two to four there's a change.
And I could calculate to run through.
And we can see those two rotations being applied.
So this is just a nice easy way to use mates,
and most commonly this is gonna be the angle mates
or distance mates.
And you have control over each and every one of these.
So a good example is this robot arm,
and you can make a whole bunch of complex animations,
just by changing the mating angles here.