With the assistance of other software applications, animations of any graphic in ZEMAX can be generated very easily.  There are numerous image capture and animation software packages available, and we are neutral on which one you should buy and use.  In this article, we have utilized Easy GIF Animator, an inexpensive and easy-to-use GIF animation software. 

Easy GIF can take a set of images, called frames, and display them in a sequence with a specified delay to create an animation effect.  An animated GIF file in Easy GIF Animator may be created from .GIF, .JPG, .JPEG, .BMP, .ICO, .EMF, and .WMF files.  As ZEMAX can export graphics to .JPG, .BMP, .EMF, and .WMF formats, a series of images can be exported from ZEMAX and imported into Easy GIF Animator as frames for animation. 

Each window can be exported one at a time manually, or you may use the power of ZPL to automate this process for you.  ZPL includes several keywords which can export graphics from ZPL.  These keywords mimic the exact GUI calls to export images. 

The EXPORTBMP, EXPORTJPG, and EXPORTWMF will export any graphics window as a BMP, JPG, or Windows Metafile, respectively.  One of these keywords, in combination with a string function ($STR), can export multiple images under different file names so that they can be loaded into your animation software. 

For the purposes of demonstrating the automation of exporting images through ZPL, we will use a simple sequential file which has been constructed solely for the purposes of drawing a coated mirror.  In conjunction with this file, a short macro will be used to export multiple JPEG images as the MIRROR is tilted about its Y axis.  Both files are available for download at the last page of this article.

FILE:  Coated MIRROR.ZMX

The following macro sets the Tilt About Y parameter on the Coordinate Break Surface before the mirror in a FOR loop.  For each tilt value, the Shaded Model window is updated and exported as a JPG file under a different filename. 



By importing the 36 images into Easy GIF Animator, we can create an animated rotation of the coated mirror for presentation purposes.

With the assistance of ZPL and animation software, the possibilities for creating ZEMAX movies are endless, and will really attract the attention of your audience.  As each animation package is different, we recommend consulting the product’s documentation for details on creating animations from files which have been exported by ZEMAX.  As you may find in several of the ZEMAX Knowledgebase articles, there are any number of possibilities to creating your own animations from exported ZEMAX graphics.