Using Animations Part 2:
Gestures

Creating a Gesture

1. Type a description for your new gesture in the Description field.
   
   
2. Enter your trigger text in the Trigger field. Chatting this text will play your gesture. The text itself will NOT be displayed in chat! You can prevent the typing animation from playing while you are typing your trigger text by including a forward slash ( / ) at the beginning of your trigger word. (This also helps to ensure that you won't inadvertently play your gesture as could possibly happen if you made your trigger text a real word with no slash preceding it and then wanted to use that word as part of a conversation!)
   
   
3. In the Replace with field type any text which you DO want your avatar to chat when you initiate the gesture. Replacement text can be up to 31 characters.
   
   
4. If you like, you can choose a Shortcut Key or key combination to trigger your gesture. Eligible shortcut keys are F2 through F12 and can be used in conjunction with the Shift or Ctrl keys, or alone with no modifier.
   
   
5. Now we get to the fun part. Select Animation, Sound, Chat or Wait from the Library options on the left and click the Add >> button to add a Step to your gesture.
   
   
6. Select a Step on the right to move it up, down, remove it from your gesture or edit it. The New Gesture editing window will give you different options for editing, depending on the step type:
   
   
   • For a Sound Step you will have a drop down list containing all of the sounds in your inventory for which you have full permissions. Click on one to select the Sound to play.
     
     
   • For a Chat Step you will have a text box into which you can input the Chat to say -- up to a maximum of 127 characters.
     
     
   • For an Animation Step you will have a drop down menu allowing you to select the Animation to play from all of the full permission animations in your inventory. You will also have radio buttons allowing you to specify whether the animation starts or stops at this point in the gesture.
     
     
   • For a Wait Step you will have checkboxes enabling you to choose whether the gesture is to wait until animaitons are done and/or for a specified time in seconds (which you can adjust) before playing the next step in the gesture. If you do not include Wait steps, all steps in your gesture will occur simultaneously.
   
   
   
7. At the bottom of the New Gesture editing window is a checkbox labelled Active. You must select this if you want your gesture to be available to you for use.
   
   
8. Preview your gesture to make sure it plays as you want it to.
   
   
9. Finally, once you are happy with your gesture, Save it.

Playing a Gesture

1. Type your Trigger text into chat.
   
   
2. Press the Shortcut Key (or key combination) you have designated.
   
   
3. Highlight the gesture in your Active Gestures window and press Play.
   
   
4. Choose the gesture from the drop-down Gestures list in the bottom right corner of your SL client.