How Rigging Works
Rigging works through the use of snapshots. A snapshot is a record of the current state
of selected parameters in your project. Widgets allows you to switch between or even
interpolate between stored snapshots. For example, you can create a snapshot where
several text objects feature black type with a white shadow, and another snapshot that
features white text with a black shadow. A checkbox widget in a rig toggles between the
two states.
A checkbox widget that toggles between two states is the simplest rigging control. Slightly
more complex is the pop-up menu widget, which lets you select between multiple
parameter states. The slider widget offers more advanced control over multiple parameter
states. For example, a slider widget lets you make gradual changes from one state to
another or even use keyframes to control how the slider widget changes. You can choose
which parameters are modified in the snapshot in a number of ways (described in more
detail in
Managing Parameter Snapshots
.)
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Chapter 10
Using Rigs
After you assign a parameter to a widget, changes you make to that parameter update
the active snapshot in that widget. For example, if the parameter is assigned to a pop-up
menu widget, the change is applied to the selected menu item.
Each parameter in a project can be assigned to only one widget at a time. However, you
can store many values for that parameter as different snapshots that can be accessed
using a pop-up menu or slider widget. (As previously noted, checkbox widgets can only
save two snapshots.)
Because a parameter cannot be controlled simultaneously by two widgets, you cannot
duplicate (or cut/copy and paste) a rig or widget object. Similarly, if you duplicate or copy
and paste an object with rigged parameters, the new object’s parameters are not rigged.
Further, if a parameter is assigned to a widget, that parameter cannot be modified while
you are recording a different widget’s snapshot. For example, if you have a slider widget
controlling a shape object’s color, and you begin recording a snapshot for a different
widget, the shape’s color is not modifiable.
Some parameter types cannot be rigged. Some parameters that use the mini-curve editor
to affect an object over a range (such as the various “over stroke” parameters in the Shape
inspector) cannot be added to a rig or modified while recording a snapshot. If you modify
a parameter that cannot be rigged in edit mode, the change is applied globally—affecting
all snapshots containing that object.