How to Make Animation in SOLIDWORKS

In SOLIDWORKS you can turn your part or assembly into a short video that shows how it looks, how it moves, and how it goes together. These animations are perfect for design reviews, manufacturing instructions, marketing material, or quick social-media clips.

This guide walks through the complete workflow: from choosing the right motion study type, to building the timeline in MotionManager, to exporting a smooth video file.

Before You Start: Motion Study Types in SOLIDWORKS

All animations live inside a Motion Study. At the bottom of the SOLIDWORKS window you will see the Motion Study tabs (Motion Study 1, Motion Study 2, …). Each study can be set to one of three types:

• Animation – best for presentation videos. It interpolates positions between keyframes but ignores physical effects like mass, gravity, and contact. Ideal for rotate/explode/fade-in/fade-out sequences.
• Basic Motion – adds simple physics. It can include gravity, contact, springs, and basic collisions, but uses a simplified solver. Good when you want parts to drop, slide, or bump into each other without doing a full engineering analysis.
• Motion Analysis – full physics-based simulation (requires the SOLIDWORKS Motion add-in). Use it to calculate realistic forces, torques, and precise motion, and optionally render those results as animations.

In this article we focus on the Animation study type, because it is available in all SOLIDWORKS licenses and covers most presentation needs. The same MotionManager interface is then shared with Basic Motion and Motion Analysis.

1. Prepare Your Model for Animation

• Finish your mates so the assembly moves correctly.
• Hide or show components the way you want them to appear.
• Optionally create an Exploded View of the assembly (ConfigurationManager > Exploded View). This will let you animate explode/collapse steps automatically later.
• Set appearances, decals, and a simple background – these settings will show up in the final video.
• Create and save any useful named views you may want to cut to during the animation.

When everything looks right in the graphics area, you are ready to build the motion study.

 

2. Create a New Motion Study

1. Open your part or assembly.
2. Set the initial view – rotate, pan, and zoom until this is the view you want the animation to start from. Save it as a named view if you like.
3. At the bottom of the window, click the Motion Study tab (for example, Motion Study 1). If you do not see it, drag up the lower edge of the graphics window.
4. On the left of the timeline, use the drop-down to change the study type to Animation.
5. Check that the start time is 0 seconds and the total duration is something reasonable (for example, 10–20 seconds to begin with). You can change this later.

Each Motion Study uses the view that is active when you start working on it. You can change or animate the view and camera later, but if you want a completely different starting angle it is often easier to make a separate motion study with a new initial view.

 

3. Understand the MotionManager Timeline

The MotionManager area at the bottom of the screen is where you build the animation:

• Left pane – a tree of parts, mates, lights, cameras, and exploded views that can be animated.
• Center timeline – time in seconds with tracks for each item. Colored bars and small key symbols are keyframes that define what happens at each time.
• Bottom controls – Play, Stop, Calculate, and controls for animation length and playback speed.

You can change timing in two ways:

• Drag key points left or right along the timeline to change when a motion starts or ends.
• Drag the end of a bar to stretch or compress the duration of that motion.

 

4. Add Quick Motions with the Animation Wizard

The Animation Wizard is the fastest way to create common movements such as rotating the whole model or playing an explode/collapse sequence.

1. With the Motion Study active, click the Animation Wizard icon in the MotionManager toolbar.
2. Choose the type of animation you want:
   • Rotate Model – spin the entire assembly about a chosen axis by a given angle over a specified time.
   • Explode or Collapse – automatically step through an existing Exploded View or collapse it back to the assembled state.
3. Define the direction, angle, and duration (for example, rotate 360° over 10 seconds).
4. Click OK to create the motion. New keyframes will appear on the timeline, which you can still drag to fine-tune the timing.

Using the Wizard first gives you a clean base animation that you can then customize with manual tweaks.

 

 

5. Manually Animate Components and Mates

Beyond the Wizard, you can animate any component or mate directly on the timeline. The key idea is:

At each time you move the model, SOLIDWORKS automatically creates keyframes for that change.

Example – sliding a component:

1. Set the time bar to 0 s. Make sure the component is in its start position.
2. Move the time bar to 2 s.
3. Drag the component to its end position (or modify the controlling mate). SOLIDWORKS adds keyframes at 2 s.
4. Play the motion – the component moves smoothly from its start position at 0 s to its end position at 2 s.

You can repeat this at different times to build more complex paths. To adjust the motion:

• Drag keyframes to new times.
• Right-click a keyframe to edit its interpolation (for example, ease-in/ease-out vs linear).
• Copy and paste keyframes to repeat motions.

6. Using Motors, Gravity, Springs and Contact

If you want parts to move because of forces – for example a door closing under gravity or a mechanism driven by a motor – switch the study type from Animation to Basic Motion or Motion Analysis before adding these features.

Then you can add:

• Motors – rotary or linear motors to drive mates at a given speed, acceleration, or motion function.
• Gravity – to make components fall or swing realistically.
• Springs and Dampers – for basic spring-like behavior.
• Contact – so parts can collide or slide against each other.

In Basic Motion these effects are approximate but fast to compute; in Motion Analysis they are more accurate and suitable for engineering calculations as well as animations.

 

7. Control the View with Cameras and Walkthroughs

Good animations are not only about part motion – the camera movement is just as important.

You can animate the view in several ways:

• Named views – store multiple orientations (Front, Isometric, custom views) and drop them on the Orientation & Camera Views track to switch between them at specific times.
• Cameras – create a camera in the Display Manager (Scene, Lights and Cameras), set a target point and field of view, then animate the camera position and orientation on the timeline. This is ideal for close-ups or dramatic angle changes.
• Walkthrough / fly-through – sketch a path and drive the camera along that path to create a tour through a building, machine, or plant layout.

To avoid unintentional view keyframes, right-click Orientation and Camera Views in the MotionManager tree and enable or disable view key creation as needed while you are editing the animation.

 

8. Preview, Calculate and Refine

Once motions and camera moves are defined, use the controls under the timeline:

• Play – quickly preview the current study.
• Calculate – for Basic Motion and Motion Analysis, this runs the solver and records the results. After calculation, playback is smooth and repeatable.
• Playback speed – adjust to watch the animation slower or faster than real time without changing the keyframes.

Typical refinement steps:

• Slide whole groups of keyframes earlier or later to sync motion with camera changes.
• Use short pauses (for example, hold the camera steady for a second) so the viewer has time to understand what they are seeing.
• Trim the total study length so the animation feels tight – for presentations, 20–40 seconds is often enough.

9. Export the Animation as a Video (AVI / MP4)

When you are happy with the animation, you can save it as a video file.

1. Click Save Animation on the MotionManager toolbar.
2. In the Save Animation to File dialog:
   • Choose the folder and file name.
   • Pick the Save as type – newer versions of SOLIDWORKS can export .MP4 as well as .AVI. MP4 usually gives much smaller files that are easier to share.
   • Set the Image Size (for example, 1920×1080 for full HD) and choose an aspect ratio that matches your target platform (16:9 for standard video, 1:1 or 4:5 for some social media formats).
   • Specify the frame rate. For smooth motion, values around 25–30 fps are typical. Higher frame rates (60 fps and above) give even smoother or slow-motion footage but increase file size and export time.
   • Under Frame Information, make sure you are exporting the entire animation unless you only want a time slice.
3. Click Save. If a compression dialog appears (for AVI), choose a suitable codec and quality level. Uncompressed video looks perfect but creates very large files; a common workflow is to save with moderate compression and, if needed, recompress later in a dedicated video editor.

For very long or complex animations, consider first exporting a short low-resolution test clip to check timing and camera work before committing to a full-quality render.

10. Optional: Render the Animation with SOLIDWORKS Visualize

The standard animation output uses the real-time SOLIDWORKS graphics, which is fast and good for most technical presentations. If you need photorealistic results (soft shadows, blurry reflections, depth of field, motion blur), you can:

1. Enable the SOLIDWORKS Motion and SOLIDWORKS Visualize add-ins.
2. Create and calculate a Motion Study as normal.
3. Export the motion study to Visualize and use it as the basis for a rendered animation.
4. In Visualize, assign high-quality materials, HDR lighting, and camera effects, then render the movie.

This workflow takes longer to compute but produces the kind of visuals used in marketing videos and product launches.

11. Practical Tips for Better SOLIDWORKS Animations

• Start simple – build a short animation with one or two key effects (for example, a 10-second model rotation and basic explode). Once that works, add more detail.
• Keep geometry light – for big assemblies, use simplified configurations or SpeedPak, and hide hardware that is not important to the story.
• Control the viewer’s attention – use zooms and camera cuts to guide the eye to key features instead of showing everything at once.
• Stay organized – rename Motion Studies (e.g., “Exploded Overview”, “Mechanism Close-up”), and use comments or markers on the timeline to keep track of sections.
• Balance quality vs time – high resolution and high frame rate look great but generate large files. For most uses, 1920×1080 at 25–30 fps is an effective compromise.

Once you understand how MotionManager, the Animation Wizard, and camera views work together, building polished SOLIDWORKS animations becomes a repeatable process. Start with a clear story – what you want to show and in what order – and then let the motion study follow that story step by step.