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Every Group within the Animator project window has animation channels. You can examine them by clicking on the triangle next to a groups ball icon. These channels contain the data which we are going to use in our expressions.
In the first step you have to tell Xpressionist which animation channels you would like to control. In the second step you type in your expression. We'll start with something simple. We will control the Z rotation of an object over time.
1. Create an Uber Shape cube and name it "Cube".
2. Click on the green triangle to make it animatable.
3. Select Xpressionist from the plugin pulldown menu to add it to the project.
Adding a Channel to Xpressionist
4. Inside the Xpressionist interface bring the Channels tab to the front.
5. Select the "Cube" object on the left and double click "Roll_Z " in the middle.
This adds the Cube's Z rotation channel to the Active Channel list on the right of the main Interface. All animation channels that you put here are available for your expressions.
Adding the Channel to the Expression Editor
6. Bring the Editor tab to the front. Double click on the channel in the Active Channel list. Now it appears in the main expression editor window - this is how channels gets added to the text of an expression.
If you don't like to double click on the channel name you could also type Cube.Roll_Z manually.
7. Continue the expression text by typing " = time; " Now the line should read
Cube.Roll_Z = time;
This line is called a statement in the expression syntax of Xpressionist.
8. Click OK and make a screen preview. Now the cube rotates around its Z axis as time increases.
Congratulations! You have just made your first expression with Xpressionist.
The word "time" in this example is a predefined variable in Xpressionist that represents the current time in seconds. It's used in our samples here since it's value increases each frame, making it quick and easy to see the expression change over time. So your Cube will be rotated 4° around its Z axis if the time slider is at 4 seconds in the animation.
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