FusionWidgets v3 Documentation

Styles > Animation Style Type

One of the best things about FusionWidgets v3 is the animated charting sequences that users get to relish. By default, FusionCharts animates only the data plot (columns, bars, lines etc.), however v3 does not limit your imagination just there.

Using the Animation Style Type, you can virtually animate each and every object on the chart. You can define custom animation styles and apply them to various objects of the chart. Each chart object has a list of supported animation properties that can be set through Animation Style Type.

Before we get to the parameters supported by the animation style type, let's quickly glance through the properties of chart objects that we can animate using Animation Style Type. The animation style type helps you with the animation of following properties:

Property	Description
_x	Helps animate the x position of the given chart object
_y	Helps animate the y position of the given chart object.
_xScale	Using this property, you can animate the x-scale (horizontal scale) of the given chart object
_yScale	Like xScale, this animates the y-scale.
_alpha	Helps alpha transition (transparency fading) animation effect
_rotation	Helps you animate objects in circular motion.

Not all parameters can be applied to all chart objects. For example, text fields cannot be x-scaled or y-scaled nor does the rotation effect apply to them. The list of animation parameters for each chart object is given in the XML Sheet of the respective chart.

Multiple animations in combination or multiple animations in sequence can also be applied to any chart object. For example, you can opt to y-scale and alpha-fade the data plot (combination animation) or you might go for x-scale first and then y-scale (sequential animation).

Let's now get to the attributes that Animation Style Type exposes to help us control the functionalities:

Attribute	Description
param	This attribute lets you specify the property of chart object which you want to animate e.g., _x, _y, _xscale etc
start	The start value of animation e.g., if you're animating the data plot for fade in alpha effect, the start value of alpha would be 0
Duration	Using this, you can control the duration of animation in seconds
Easing	This attribute lets you specify the pattern of animation easing. Valid values are "elastic", "bounce", "regular", "strong" or "none".

For the Animation Style Type, except Easing, all the above attributes are mandatory

Before getting to detailed explanations, let's quickly cruise through a quick animation sample. Let's try and animate our canvas so that it scales up after the chart is loaded.

To do so, we first need to define our custom style. Since scaling up involves sequential increment of both _xScale and _yScale, we'll now need to define two animation styles and then apply them to Canvas object. The style definition goes as under:

In the above code, we name the two styles as MyXScaleAnim and MyYScaleAnim with their param (animation parameter) as _xscale and _yscale respectively. We set start value as 0, we want the canvas to scale up from 0 to 100 (remember that scales are always from 0-100 in FusionCharts). We also specify the duration as 1 for the animation sequence.

To apply this animation style to canvas, the following code is used:

If you run the above code against a data-streaming chart, you'll see that the canvas scales up from 0 size to full size, before the data is animated and rendered. Bingo! Exactly what we needed! Let's move on to the attributes in details now.

param attribute

The param attribute specifies the property of chart object, which is to be animated. As earlier discussed, it can take one of the following values, depending on the chart object:

_x
_y
_xScale
_yScale
_alpha
_rotation

We reiterate that not all chart objects support all the above properties. Please refer to the XML Sheet for the given chart to get the list of supported animation parameters for each chart object.

Setting the start position of animation object

In our above example, where we were scaling the canvas from 0 to 100, we had set the start value of animation to 0, as we want the canvas to scale from 0 to 100. You always need to set a start value for any animation style. The end value is decided by FusionCharts based on the chart object and animation parameter.

For example, if you want to animate the y position of div lines from 0 to their final position (which is within the canvas), you need to set start position to 0. But since you do not know the end position of individual div line, it's automatically set by FusionCharts.

Similarly, if you want to animate the div lines Y position for a chart, whose height is 500 pixels, from bottom to the respective final position, you'll need to set start position as 500. The end position again will be decided by FusionCharts.

Specifying the easing for animation

Easing refers to gradual acceleration or deceleration during an animation. For example, a chart object might gradually increase its speed near the beginning of an animation, but slow down right at the end of the animation before it arrives at a full stop. There are many different equations for the acceleration and deceleration, which change the easing animation accordingly. Easing helps your animations appear more realistic.

FusionCharts v3 supports the following easing methods:

Methods	Description
Elastic	Adds an elastic effect that falls outside the transition range at one or both ends. The amount of elasticity is unaffected by the duration
Bounce	Adds a bouncing effect within the transition range at one or both ends. The number of bounces relates to the duration—longer durations produce more bounces
Strong	Adds slower movement at one or both ends. This effect is similar to Regular easing, but it's more pronounced
Regular	Adds slower movement at one or both ends. This feature enables you to add a speeding-up effect, a slowing-down effect, or both.
None	Adds an equal movement from start to end without effects, slowing, or speeding up. This transition is also referred to as a linear transition.

For any of the above easing method, FusionCharts provides the easing effect at the end of the transition. For example, if you animate the columns from 0 _yscale to 100 _yscale, you'll see that the columns animated very fast in the start (they grow up very soon) but the animation at the end part is slow.

You can use any of the above easing methods for any animation style that you define.