Texture State Animation

This skill exists because “crossfade several full images” usually looks bad. Texture animation must be designed like motion graphics: registered states, constrained transition channels, and preview gates.

Failure modes to avoid

• Whole-frame crossfades between unrelated crops/compositions.
• Python frame handlers as the only playback mechanism when export/runtime support is needed.
• Texture swaps that change silhouette, camera crop, or scale at the same time as decorative motion.
• Mixing aura/background/HUD pixels into the avatar surface texture unless that is the intent.
• Morph pulses that break accepted geometry constraints such as constant depth.

Workflow

1. Register states first: crop, scale, align, and color-normalize all source states into one canvas and one semantic mask.
2. Classify pixels/layers:
   • avatar surface/base;
   • facial decal/features;
   • glow/emission accents;
   • background/aura/context;
   • HUD/circle elements.
3. Choose transition type per layer, not one global blend:
   • avatar surface: hold, shimmer, subtle value/roughness pulse, or masked dissolve;
   • face features: hold or short opacity fade;
   • glow accents: emission pulse / traveling highlight;
   • aura/HUD: independent orbit/dash/dot animation;
   • background: separate plane/compositor, never baked into avatar unless requested.
4. Use export-compatible channels when needed:
   • keyframed material values, opacity, UV transform, shape keys, object transforms;
   • image sequence only if target supports it;
   • avoid Blender Python handlers for final GLB unless the target runtime will recreate them.
5. Render a contact sheet and flicker report before calling the animation acceptable.

Acceptance gates

• Each texture state is registered to the same bbox/landmarks.
• No full-canvas crossfade is used unless state registration and semantics match.
• Avatar silhouette remains stable unless the story explicitly calls for a morph.
• Context/aura elements are separate from the avatar material.
• The exported format can reproduce the animation, or limitations are documented.

Scripts

• scripts/texture_transition_plan.py creates a transition plan from source states and flags risky whole-frame crossfades.