Animation Object Matching via Distance Metrics and Drag Heuristics
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Solution Overview
Problem
Visual designers face challenges in authoring animations for mobile and web applications, particularly in matching objects across multiple artboards and previewing animations, due to the complexity of interactions like dragging and swiping, and the limitations of existing tools that require developer-oriented concepts and inconvenient input methods.
Innovation Solution
An automated animation technique that matches objects between artboards using distance metrics based on attributes such as position, size, and layer hierarchy, and a drag heuristics process for interactive previewing, allowing designers to link multiple artboards in a temporal sequence and generate intuitive control interfaces.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Extent of automation
If automated object matching is performed using name and type attributes, then object association between artboards is achieved, but matching accuracy deteriorates when duplicate object names exist across artboards
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extends the matching criteria from basic name and type attributes to include multiple additional parameters such as position, size, layer hierarchy, and other geometric properties. By changing and expanding the parameter set used for matching, the system can distinguish between duplicate object names and achieve accurate object association even when names are not unique across artboards.
2Ease of operation
If designers use known animation techniques requiring drag direction input, then animation preview is possible, but ease of operation deteriorates due to inconvenient input requirements
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically determines the drag direction by analyzing the initial and final positions of objects between artboards. Instead of requiring designers to manually specify drag direction, the system performs the analysis itself and uses the computed direction for animation preview, thereby simplifying the user interface and improving ease of operation.
3Adaptability or versatility
If multiple artboards are linked in temporal sequence, then complex interactions like dragging and swiping can be animated, but device complexity increases due to multiple canvases requiring association
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a universal object matching system that works across multiple artboards using consistent criteria (name, type, position, size, layer hierarchy). This multi-functional matching approach allows the same mechanism to handle various interaction types (dragging, swiping, fading) across multiple canvases, thereby supporting complex interactions while maintaining system manageability through a unified matching framework.
Data Source
AI summary
Techniques for performing automatic interactive animation by automatically matching objects between multiple artboards, allowing an animator to link multiple artboards in a temporal sequence using time as a trigger and allowing an animator to preview an animation using intuitive drag controls via an input device such as a mouse or touch screen. An automatic animation process is performed by matching objects/nodes between artboards by determining a ranking of similarity between objects based upon a distance metric computed for a set of one or more attributes associated with each object in the artboards. If sufficient match is found, the matched objects can be treated as a single entity to be animated. In another embodiment, dominant direction of movement with respect to the matched objects is determined, and receipt of a drag event (mouse input or touch screen gesture input) in said dominant direction causes a preview of animation of that entity.