Hi Steve,
You can use other commands with frame arguments (perframe, etc.) to do other things at the same time as the movement transitions.  In a command file, if you put multiple commands on the same line separated by semicolons (and no “wait” command between), they start executing at the same time.
<http://rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/perframe.html>

See the general information about making movies
<http://rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/movies.html>

…and scripting with command files
<http://rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/usageconventions.html#cxc-files>

To divide into more positioning stages, you would have to save more views at the intermediate positions.  Each transition would still be pairwise between two views.

In Chimera we had “scenes” that included not only position but also display styles and colors, and transitions between scenes, but they are not currently available in ChimeraX.
I hope this helps,
Elaine
-----
Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D.                       
UCSF Chimera(X) team
Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry
University of California, San Francisco




> On Feb 21, 2019, at 6:04 AM, Steve Chou <stevezchou@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks Elaine! This is exactly what I want.
> =============
> # save current view settings
> view save my_view_name
>
> # move to another position, zoom in or out, and color some residues etc
>
> # get back to the original view in 20 frames along a STRAIGHT line
> view my_view_name 20
> =============
>
> In the 20 frames of transition time, I can not do anything now. Is it possible to do something during the transition, like changing the surface transparency? Can we save the view matrix, devide the transition into many steps, and  do something else ( not motion-related, but coloring-related, etc) at each step?
> Steve
>
>
> On Wed, Feb 20, 2019 at 7:45 PM Elaine Meng <meng@cgl.ucsf.edu> wrote:
> Hi Steve,
> Not sure if it will solve the problem, but you could try saving views (“view save”) of the desired start and end positions, possibly also intermediate positions, and then use “view” with frames argument to gradually transition from one previously saved view to the another.  Saved views and their names are included in saved sessions.
> Elaine
>
> <http://rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/view.html#name>
>
> > On Feb 20, 2019, at 4:30 PM, Steve Chou <stevezchou@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Dear ChimeraX team,
> > Thanks for your fast and detailed responses to my questions!
> >
> > If a spot is in the center of view, we can zoom into the spot through a straight line. If it's not, it's really difficult to get there through a straight line.
> > I tried something like this in a "movie" script, but it's still not straight.
> > =========
> > move y -20
> > zoom 1.25
> > wait 2
> > move y -20
> > zoom 1.25
> > wait 2
> > move y -20
> > zoom 1.25
> > wait 2
> > =========
> > Is there a way to zoom into a spot that is not in the center of view through a straight line.
> > Steve
> > --
> > Steve Chou
> >
> >
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>
> --
> Steve Chou
>
>
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