Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
can improve playback performance on com-
plex scenes at the cost of playback accuracy.
At the left side of Figure 2-82 is the
(Animation) Preview pop-up menu. Build-
ing and playing animation previews is
discussed in Chapter 15, so just store this
info away for later.
At the bottom of Figure 2-82, you'll find
Layout's Undo/Redo buttons. The number
of Undos available can be set in the General
Options panel (more on that later).
Key Creation/Deletion
Figure 2-84: The Create Key
and Delete Key buttons.
Just to the left of the frame controls are the
buttons that let you create and delete
keyframes for your items.
Hot Key Block
Time Controls
<Left Arrow>
steps to the previous frame
of your scene. (At the first frame of your
scene, the Frame Slider “wraps around” to
the last frame of your scene.)
<Right Arrow>
advances to the next frame
of your scene. (Again, at the end of your
scene, the Frame Slider “wraps around” to
the beginning.)
<Shift> + <Left Arrow>
jumps to the pre-
vious keyframe of the currently selected
item.
<Shift> + <Right Arrow>
jumps to the
next keyframe of the currently selected item.
Undo/Redo
<Ctrl> + <z>
and
<z>
respectively
undoes and redoes what can be undone and
redone.
Figure 2-85: Create Key brings up a window where
you can tell LightWave to remember the position,
rotation, and/or scale along any axis for your
choice of items.
Delete Key works the same as Create Key
(only it deletes keyframes, rather than cre-
ating them).
Note
You can enter any frame in the Create Key
At box. (You aren't limited to creating
keyframes only on your current frame.)
For looping animations, I make sure the
scene's “head” and “tail” match up by creat-
ing a keyframe for all items on the last
frame of my scene, referencing the position
of everything on the first frame.
To do this, you move the Frame Slider to
the first frame of your scene, click on Create
Key, type in the number of the last frame of
the scene in the Create Key At box, and
choose All Items in the For pop-up menu.
