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<H1 class="wai">The STK Clip Manager utility, version 1.6, January 2008</H1>
<H1>Overview</H1>
<P>STK Clip Manager is a utility that streamlines the process of creating and
rendering video clips from STK, by managing a list of video clips available to
record from a given scenario. A simple interface and flexible integration with
STK make recording easy from both 2D and 3D graphics windows. Multiple video
clips with different animation and display settings can be recorded as a batch,
without user intervention. This tool is highly recommended for anyone recording
video from STK.</P>
<H1>Intended Audience</H1>
<P>Any STK user who records videos of their STK scenarios could potentially benefit
from Clip Manager. In particular, if several video clips are being
recorded from one scenario, or if the scenario may undergo changes and require
re-recording, Clip Manager offers features to streamline the process.</P>
<H1>Distribution</H1>
<P>STK Clip Manager may be distributed free of charge.</P>
<H1>Requirements</H1>
<P>For Clip Manager to be useful, you will need an installation of <A href="http://www.agi.com/products/desktopApp/stkFamily/">
STK</A> with either the <A href="http://www.agi.com/products/desktopApp/stkFamily/modules/integration/stk_integration/">
STK/Integration</A> module, or the <A href="http://www.agi.com/products/desktopApp/stkFamily/editions/">
STK Expert Edition</A>.</P>
<H1>Install</H1>
<P>ClipMgr.exe is a single, self-contained executable file. It can be copied
anywhere on your hard drive, and run simply by double-clicking it. No formal
installation process is required.</P>
<H1>Quick Start Guide</H1>
<P>The next few steps offer an example of how to get familiar with Clip Manager in
a short amount of time.</P>
<H2>1. Launch STK and STK Clip Manager</H2>
<P>You will need an STK scenario running on your machine, with some subject
material in it that you intend to use to record some movie clips. Load a
suitable scenario, and then launch Clip Manager in front of it.</P>
<H2>2. Connect to STK</H2>
<P>The status bar along the bottom-right edge of Clip Manager should have a message
that says <STRONG>NOT CONNECTED</STRONG> on it. You will need to
connect Clip Manager to STK in order to get the most functionality from
it. Find a toolbar icon that looks like a black plug, about halfway along
the top-left toolbar in ClipMgr.</P>
<P><IMG height="103" src="images/ConnectButton.gif" width="398"></P>
<P>Click this button to get the <STRONG>Connect to STK</STRONG> dialog.</P>
<P><IMG height="140" src="images/ConnectDialog.gif" width="341"></P>
<P>The settings shown above are the default settings for Connect. They should
work fine unless you have changed your default settings in STK. The
checkbox options below offer additional functionality. Switch on the <STRONG>Automatically
connect</STRONG> option if you wish to skip this step in the future.
</P>
<P>When you click <STRONG>OK</STRONG>, ClipMgr will attempt to establish the
connection. If it works, you will see your connection string (ie, <STRONG>localhost:5001</STRONG>)
appear on the status bar at the bottom. Also, several toolbar buttons
will become available that were previously grayed out.</P>
<H2>3. Add a clip</H2>
<P>With the connection established, you are ready to design movie clips that
portray action taking place in your STK scenario. Begin by clicking the <STRONG>
Add Clip</STRONG> button, to create your first clip.</P>
<P class="note"><STRONG>NOTE:</STRONG> Clicking this button while connected to STK
will query your scenario for the current animation time settings, and import
them into Clip Manager as the settings for the newly created clip.</P>
<P><IMG height="103" src="images/AddClipButton.gif" width="441"></P>
<P>The Clip Manager interface is broken into three main sections. The
upper-left section is a list of clips, which should now have your first clip
listed in it. Below that is a small pane with an empty Connect script
(this will be described later). On the right-hand side is a list of
properties of the clip that has been added and selected on the left.</P>
<P><img src="images/MainInterface.gif" height="289" width="410"></P>
<H2>4. Set the clip's anim time settings</H2>
<P>You have an STK scenario with some activity taking place that you wish to
record. It may take many movie clips to document all the action, but for
now concentrate on just the first movie clip. You'll need to decide the
animation start and end time for this portion of the action, along with a
playback speed and/or an animation length. Clip Manager is here to help
you make these decisions.</P>
<P><IMG height="148" src="images/AnimTimes.gif" width="179"></P>
<P>The settings shown above are part of the clip's properties, in the right-hand
properties panel of Clip Manager. This portion of the interface acts as
an animation time calculator.</P>
<P class="note"><STRONG>NOTE:</STRONG> The <STRONG>anim start</STRONG> and <STRONG>anim
end</STRONG> times are shown in <STRONG>Epoch Seconds</STRONG>, and the <STRONG>
time step</STRONG> and <STRONG>run time</STRONG> are shown in <STRONG>seconds</STRONG>.
You may wish to set your STK time units to Epoch Seconds when you work with
Clip Manager, so that your STK time displays match the ones in Clip Manager.</P>
<P>An animation is recorded as a series of frames, from the anim start to the anim
end, at intervals given by the timestep. Regardless of how quickly the
frames are recorded, playback typically happens at 30 frames per second.
Thus, a simple formula governs the relationship between all of these values:</P>
<P class="math" align="center">(AnimEnd - AnimStart) / TimeStep = RunTime * 30fps</P>
<P>Clip Manager will solve for any one of these four variables, given the other
three. The default configuration, shown on the above panel, calculates
run time based on start, end, and time step. In this case, a full day's
worth of seconds is specified between start (<STRONG>0.00</STRONG>) and end (<STRONG>86400.00</STRONG>).
One frame will be recorded every <STRONG>60</STRONG> seconds' worth of scenario
time. Thus, <STRONG>1440</STRONG> total frames are scheduled to be
recorded, and playback of such a movie clip would last for <STRONG>48</STRONG> seconds.</P>
<P>As a further example, let's say that you want to adjust these values so your
movie clip is only <STRONG>5</STRONG> seconds long, not <STRONG>48</STRONG> seconds
long. This means that your animation will have to start later, or end
sooner, or take larger time steps in between. Let's also say that you've
decided you like the <STRONG>60</STRONG> second timestep, and you want the
animation to start at time <STRONG>0.00</STRONG>, but you're least concerned
with what scenario time it ends. In this case, you would click the round
radio button next to <STRONG>Anim End</STRONG>, and then enter your desired
value of <STRONG>5</STRONG> into the <STRONG>Run Time</STRONG> field.
Clip Manager then calculates an appropriate anim end time for you, as shown
here.</P>
<P><IMG height="145" src="images/AnimTimes2.gif" width="184"></P>
<P>Any of the four settings with radio buttons can be calculated based on the
values of the other three, as shown here. This lets you specify the
values that matter the most, and calculate the one that matters least (or has
the most flexibility).</P>
<P>The <STRONG>Run Time</STRONG> field looks at the first letter in a word to
identify the units. Three letters are understood: <STRONG>h</STRONG> for
hours, <STRONG>m</STRONG> for minutes, and <STRONG>s</STRONG> for
seconds. Additional letters are safely ignored. For example, "3m",
"3 mins", and "3 Minutes" are all correctly understood when entered. For
an additional 30 seconds, the user could enter "3m30s" or "3 mins 30 Seconds,"
whichever feels more natural. It is not case-sensitive. If no units
are entered, the number is treated as seconds.</P>
<P>Don't bother entering values into STK's scenario animation properties page by
hand. In fact, once you get accustomed to Clip Manager, you may find that
the animation page as well as the SoftVTR page in STK have both become
obsolete. Use Clip Manager instead.</P>
<H2>5. Testing with Play Normal and Play XRealTime</H2>
<P>Many other properties of your new clip have not yet been set, however, you may
wish to test out the feel of the anim time settings you have selected.
When adjusting any settings on your clip, it is important to test frequently to
see if your scenario is headed in the right direction. There are two main
methods of testing: <STRONG>Play Normal</STRONG> and <STRONG>Play XRealTime</STRONG>.
These are the two right-most buttons on the toolbar with the VCR-style
controls.</P>
<P><IMG height="75" src="images/PlayNormal.gif" width="328"></P>
<P><STRONG>Play Normal</STRONG> will send over a series of Connect commands to
queue up your animation times and other settings into STK, and cause it to
animate through your movie clip without actually recording it. Playback
happens in the normal "Step Time" mode of STK, which means that every frame of
animation will be rendered and shown during the test.</P>
<P>The only problem with this method is that not all computers are fast enough to
show you what your animation will look like when played back at the full 30
frames per second. Note the "fps" reading in the bottom-right status bar
area of STK. If it shows you a number other than 30 during playback, then
what you're seeing during the test is not playing at the same speed that a
finished movie would play.</P>
<P><IMG height="75" src="images/PlayXRealTime.gif" width="328"></P>
<P><STRONG>Play XRealTime</STRONG> takes a different approach. <STRONG>XRealTime</STRONG>
is a mode in STK where the scenario plays back at a rate based off a realtime
clock, multiplied by an "X" factor. If the X factor is <STRONG>1.0</STRONG>,
for example, STK plays 1 second of scenario time for every 1 second of
realtime. Likewise, if the X factor is <STRONG>5.0</STRONG>, STK will
play through 5 seconds of scenario time every second. You don't need to
calculate the X factor yourself, of course, because Clip Manager does it for
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