According to Wikipedia, “Animation is a method in which figures are manipulated to appear as moving objects.” Animation in an app is essential to provide an appealing UI and better responsiveness. A cross-platform application like a .NET Multi-platform App UI (.NET MAUI) app also needs animation to make it more attractive.
Two kinds of animation can be applied in .NET MAUI:
- Basic animations
- Lottie animations
In this blog, let’s take a quick look at these animation methods.
.NET MAUI basic animation
As stated in the Microsoft documentation, “The .NET Multi-platform App UI (.NET MAUI) animation classes target different properties of visual elements, with a typical basic animation progressively changing a property from one value to another over a period of time.”
Built-in animations
There are four basic built-in animations available in .NET MAUI:
- Fade
- Rotation
- Scale
- Translate
Fade
Fade animation can fade in and fade out a view by changing the opacity. Refer to the following code example.
this.fadeInImage.Opacity = 0; //Fade in await this.fadeInImage.FadeTo(1, 2000); //Fade out await this.fadeInImage.FadeTo(0, 2000);
Rotation
Rotate a view using the Rotate support. You can use general, vertical, horizontal, or relative rotation.
Refer to the following code example.
this.rotateImage.Rotation = 0; // General rotation await this.rotateImage.RotateTo(360, 2000); // Vertical rotation await this.rotateImage.RotateXTo(360 , 2000); // Horizontal rotation await this.rotateImage.RotateYTo(360, 2000);
Note: We can also rotate horizontally, vertically, and relatively using the RotateXTo, RotateYTo, and RelRotateTo APIs, respectively.
Scale
We can scale a view using the Scale property. There are four types of scaling: vertical, horizontal, aspect, and relative.
Refer to the following code example.
// Zoom in await this.scaleImage.ScaleTo(1, 2000); // Zoom out await this.scaleImage.ScaleTo(0, 2000); // Horizontal scaling await this.scaleImage.ScaleXTo(1, 2000); await this.scaleImage.ScaleXTo(0, 2000); // Vertical scaling await this.scaleImage.ScaleYTo(1, 2000); await this.scaleImage.ScaleYTo(0, 2000);
Note: We can also scale horizontally, vertically, and relatively using the ScaleXTo, SacleYTo, and RelScaleTo APIs, respectively.
Translate
We can translate a view to another location with an animation. Refer to the following code example.
// Translate to right await this.translateImage.TranslateTo(50, 0, 1000); // Translate to bottom await this.translateImage.TranslateTo(0, 50, 1000); // Translate to left await this.translateImage.TranslateTo(-50, 0, 1000); // Translate to top await this.translateImage.TranslateTo(0, -50, 1000); // Diagonal translation await this.translateImage.TranslateTo(50, 50, 1000);
Note: You can also create these animations with easing functions.
Lottie animation
Lottie animations are free, open-source packages that can be used in your .NET MAUI apps. They animate elements using a JSON file that contains the content for the animation. There are a lot of options available in Lottie animation.
Follow these steps to add Lottie animation to a .NET MAUI application.
Step 1: First, create a .NET MAUI application.
Step 2: Right-click on the project and select Manage NuGet Packages. Browse for SkiaSharp.Extended.UI.Maui and install the package.
Step 3: Then, open the MauiProgram.cs file and configure the SkiaShap like in the following code.
using SkiaSharp.Views.Maui.Controls.Hosting; builder.UseSkiaSharp();
Step 4: Go to the MainPage.xaml and add the SkiaSharp namespace. Refer to the following code.
<ContentPage xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/dotnet/2021/maui"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2009/xaml"
xmlns:skia="clr-namespace:SkiaSharp.Extended.UI.Controls;assembly=SkiaSharp.Extended.UI"
x:Class="MAUIAnimations.MainPage">Step 5: Finally, add SkLottieView with the options RepeatCount, Repeat Mode, and Source.
Note: Refer to the LottieFiles for a list of JSON files that can be used to add animation to your app. After preparing the JSON file, add it to Resource-> Raw Folder.
Refer to the following code example.
<skia:SKLottieView RepeatCount="-1"
RepeatMode="Reverse"
Source="example.json"
WidthRequest="300"
HeightRequest="300"/>
Conclusion
Thanks for reading! I hope you are now aware of how to add animations to your .NET MAUI application. In part two of this blog, we’ll look at custom animation in .NET MAUI!
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