Introduction

Unity 5 builds on the introduction of powerful 2D features in the Mecanim animation system and the 2D physics system that were introduced in Unity 4.6 late 2014. In this chapter, we present a range of recipes to introduce the basics of 2D animation in Unity 5, and help you understand the relationships between the different animation elements.

The big picture

In Unity 2D animations can be created in several different ways – one way is to create many images, each slightly different, which frame-by-frame give the appearance of movement. A second way to create animations is by defining keyframe positions for individual parts of an object (for example, the arms, legs, feet, head, eyes, and so on), and getting Unity to calculate all the in-between positions when the game in running.

Both sources of animations become Animation Clips in the Animation panel. Each Animation Clip then becomes a State in the Animator Controller State Machine. We then define under what conditions a GameObject...