.. index::
    pair: Animation; Pipeline

======================
The Animation Pipeline
======================

The animation pipeline supports the export of keyframed animation for hierarchies of nodes from 3D modeling packages
via Collada.

For a given Collada scene the `dae2json` tool will export 1 or more animation clips from a single Collada scene along
with the geometry and nodes which are to be animated by the animation. It is also possible to run the tool with a
switch to export only the animation clips from the file, this can be used where the animations are modeled in
multiple scenes within the modeling package, and hence exported to multiple Collada scenes.
Animation clips can be exported to Collada scenes by setting them up with tools such as the Trax editor in Maya. Where
multiple animation clips are present in the Collada scene multiple animations will be exported to the output scene with
matching names. Where no clips are present in the Collada scene all the animations in the scene will be grouped into
a single animation name "default" (can be overridden via a tool parameter)

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Workflow
--------

* Model skinned/rigid objects in 3D modeling package
* Create one or more animations in that scene or clones of the scene
* Export animation scenes to Collada (one or more Collada scene)
* Execute `dae2json` on each Collada file (using animation only flag if there are many scenes)
* Load converted scenes into user application