Orbital Hud Motion

---
name: orbital-hud-motion
description: Create tasteful circular/orbital HUD and aura animations around a Blender subject using source-derived arcs, dots, dashes, opacity, parallax, and restrained motion. Use when decorative circles, halos, orbit markers, scanner rings, or HUD effects must correlate with a logo/mascot rather than looking like random oversized rings.
when_to_use: Animated circular HUD elements, aura rings, orbit arcs, dots, dashed circles, halo effects, mascot/logo motion graphics, source-derived decorative elements, avoiding bad outside-element animation.
allowed-tools: Read Bash Glob Grep mcp__blender__execute_blender_code mcp__blender__get_scene_info mcp__blender__get_object_info
---

# Orbital HUD Motion

Decorative circles are design elements, not filler. They must be derived from the reference composition and support the subject.

## Design rules

- Keep the avatar/subject dominant; rings should frame, not trap or overpower it.
- Derive radii, arc breaks, marker positions, and dash density from the reference image when possible.
- Separate layers:
  - far/background aura: faint, slow, soft;
  - mid orbit: thin arcs/dashes;
  - markers/dots: sparse and synchronized;
  - foreground accents: rare and short-lived.
- Prefer opacity/emission/dash phase over large rotation/scale changes.
- Never animate all rings in the same direction/speed; use subtle counter-motion/parallax.
- Do not include context rings in the base avatar mesh/export unless explicitly requested.

## Animation recipe

1. Create an `HUD_CONTEXT` collection separate from `AVATAR_BASE`.
2. Build arcs/dots from a manifest of normalized radii and angles.
3. Keyframe:
   - dash offset or arc reveal;
   - emission strength pulse;
   - subtle rotation (1–12 degrees per loop, not full spin unless requested);
   - marker opacity/scale blips at beats.
4. Render a contact sheet with subject-only and with-HUD views.
5. Reject if rings obscure the face/silhouette or dominate the frame.

## Hard rules

- No random full circles when the reference has broken arcs/dashed guides.
- No oversized markers unless the source has them.
- No HUD animation until static avatar baseline is locked.
- For GLB, use object transforms/material keyframes or document runtime requirements.

## Scripts

- `scripts/orbit_layout_manifest.py` creates a source-independent orbit manifest from simple radii/angle parameters.