Control

Introduction

Control is a tool, that allows you to

• view objects moving along their trajectories
• view objects moving backwards along their trajectories
• view collisions of objects moving along their trajectories
• record objects moving along their trajectories (with their collisions)
• export recorded videos

Usage

1. Install Animate workbench if you haven't done so already.
2. Open a file in FreeCAD.
3. Select Animate workbench on the workbench toolbar.
4. Click on control's icon on Animate toolbar or select control in Animate menu.
5. Open a Combo View ( View > Panels > Combo View ).
6. Put some existing trajectory, collision detector and server tools inside control tool.
7. Select control tool in a tree view on a Model Tab inside the Combo View.
8. Go to Timing properties on a Data Tab inside the Combo View.
9. Set up Start Time, Step Time and Stop Time so that desired Timestamps of trajectory tools are in that range.
10. If you want to record sequences and export videos
    1. Install necessary third party software.
    2. Select Export Path into a directory where recorded sequences will be saved.
    3. Set Video Width and Video Height.
11. Double click the control tool in the tree view on a Model Tab inside the Combo View.
12. A control's dialog is opened on a Tasks tab inside the Combo view.
13. Use a slider in the control's dialog to skim through the range you specified or click
    • PLAY - to view objects following their trajectories
    • REWIND - to view objects moving backwards along their trajectories
    • RECORD - to record objects following their trajectories into a set of images
    • PAUSE - to pause playing, rewinding or recording
    • EXPORT - to export recorded sets of images into a video
14. Change more properties according to your preferences, their meanings are explained in the properties section.

Third-party software

Installing python PyPNG module on Windows 10:

1. Check that you have internet connection.
2. Open a command line window with admin privileges (Win + X, A).
3. Go to bin directory in FreeCAD's home folder - probably C:/Program Files/FreeCAD 0.18/ and if not, then
   • Open FreeCAD
   • Open a Python console ( View > Panels > Python console ).
   • Type command FreeCAD.getHomePath() to obtain FreeCAD's home folder path.
4. Type command python.exe -m pip install pyPNG

Installing python PyPNG module on Ubuntu 18.04:

1. Check you have internet connection.
2. Open a terminal.
3. If you installed FreeCAD using Personal Package Archives (PPA) and sudo apt‑get install freecad
• Type command sudo python.exe -m pip install pyPNG
• or pip install pyPNG
  depending on which is connected to correct python version (if you have both 2.7 and 3.x.y)
4. If you installed FreeCAD using snap or software center
No way how to install additional python modules has been found yet. So exporting videos with automatically saved framerate is unavailable.
5. If you installed FreeCAD using an appImage
No way how to install additional python modules has been found yet So exporting videos with automatically saved framerate is unavailable.

Installing FFmpeg codec on Windows 10:

1. Go to FFmpeg site.
2. Download the latest FFmpeg build for your Windows version (64bit/32bit).
3. Extract it from an archive.
4. Put its contents (folders like bin, doc etc. and files like LICENSE.txt and README.txt ) into C:\ffmpeg folder.
5. Add C:\ffmpeg\bin\ to your Windows 10 path (edit the system environment variables).

Installing FFmpeg codec on Ubuntu 18.04:

1. Open a terminal.
2. Type sudo apt‑get install ffmpeg

Properties