[Chimera-users] MD movie export from per frame script

[Elaine Meng]

On Feb 17, 2015, at 9:49 PM, Ankit Agrawal <aka895 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all
> I want to write a script which can create movie (.mp4) from per frame script. Because I want to show all models in movie. Please help
> Thanks
> Ankit Agrawal
> Department of Chemical Science
> IISER Mohali, India

Hi Ankit,
The per-frame scripting feature in the MD Movie dialog is not intended for making movies.  

If you want to make a movie that includes playback of the trajectory being shown with MD Movie, there are two main choices:

(1) use MD Movie menu: File… Record movie.  This will create a movie of all or part of your trajectory, as specified in the dialog, and there are several choices for image quality and output format (including .mp4). See MD Movie documentation, especially the section "Recording a Movie":
<http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/ContributedSoftware/movie/framemovie.html>
<http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/ContributedSoftware/movie/movie.html#recording>

(2) if you want your movie to include some other things, like showing other structures, rotating, zooming, 2D labels etc. in addition to just playing back your trajectory, you could instead write a Chimera command script to control the whole process.   The command to play back part or all of your trajectory is "coordset", and the command that controls movie recording and saving is "movie."  See the list of movie-making commands and some example scripts:
<http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/movies.html#content>
<http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/movies.html#examples>

In that examples list, especially see "ball-and-socket motion" because the script includes playing back a trajectory that was created with morphing.

I hope this helps,
Elaine
----------
Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. 
UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab
Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry
University of California, San Francisco