DawnCamera

Cinematic camera transitions for Minecraft networks, by qFane.

When a player leaves a server, the camera pulls up into the sky and fades to black. When they arrive on the next server, it stays black while the world and resource pack load, then fades in and flies down to the spawn.

• Works with every server switch: /switchserver, /lobby, Velocity's /server, ajQueue, menus and NPCs that send players to servers.
• Checks that the target server is online before animating.
• With ajQueue installed, /switchserver, /lobby and server plugins join ajQueue's queue instead of switching directly, so full or offline servers queue; the animation plays when ajQueue sends the player.
• Waits for the resource pack (Oraxen, ForcePack, Nexo, ItemsAdder) so the loading screen never hides the pan.
• Animations are simple YAML files: copy one, change a few numbers, /dc reload.
• Players who get motion sick can be exempted network-wide with one permission.

Animations

sky	orbit	shake
Straight up and down	Spirals around the spawn	Straight up with a rumble

Other players see the leaving player vanish in a swirl of particles:

More animations are on the way. You can also make your own in a few lines of YAML.

Requirements

• Velocity 4.x proxy
• Paper 26.x servers behind it
• Java 25
• Servers must answer status pings from the proxy (enable-status=true, the default, and no backend anti-bot limiting the proxy's pings): the proxy pings a server before animating and reports it offline if it doesn't answer.

Install

1. Put dawncamera-velocity-<version>.jar in the proxy's plugins/ folder.
2. Put dawncamera-paper-<version>.jar in the plugins/ folder of every server that should animate. Servers without it (an auth or limbo server) are detected automatically and switch away instantly.
3. Restart the proxy and the servers.
4. On each server, stand where players should land and run /dc setspawn.

Commands

Where	Command	Permission	What it does
Proxy	/switchserver <server>	same as Velocity's /server (velocity.command.server)	Switch server with the animation
Proxy	/switchserver <server> <player>	dawncamera.send (console has it)	Send any online player there, skipping ajQueue
Proxy	/lobby, /hub	everyone	Switch to the first server in velocity.toml's try list (skipped if another proxy plugin already owns the command)
Server	/switchserver <server> [player]	yourself: Velocity's /server rule; others: dawncamera.admin	For plugins that run commands on the server; sending someone else skips ajQueue
Server	/dc (/dawncamera)	dawncamera.admin (op)	Show status
Server	/dc reload	dawncamera.admin	Reload config and animations
Server	/dc setspawn	dawncamera.admin	Set the landing spot to where you stand and look
Server	/dc animation <join|leave> <name>	dawncamera.admin	Choose this server's animations
Server	/dc test <join|leave> [name]	dawncamera.admin	Preview an animation on yourself where you stand, without switching
Server	/dc fade <on|off>	dawncamera.admin	Toggle fade to black
Server	/dc debug	dawncamera.admin	Log game-mode changes and teleports, and which plugin caused them

NPCs, portals and menus: use their "send to server" action (e.g. FancyNpcs send_to_server, DeluxeMenus [connect]). The proxy animates every switch, and the player needs no /server permission for it. Plugins can also call DawnCameraPaper#transfer(player, server).

dawncamera.bypass (servers, default off): skip both the join and leave animation. Grant it network-wide (e.g. with LuckPerms) to players who get motion sick. If you give yourself or a staff group *, that includes this bypass: set dawncamera.bypass to false on that group (lp group owner permission set dawncamera.bypass false) or you will never see the animations.

Configuration

Each server has plugins/DawnCamera/config.yml (which animations, fade, sounds, spawn, resource pack waiting, titles) and an animations/ folder. The proxy needs no configuration.

Making animations

Every file in plugins/DawnCamera/animations/ is an animation; the file name is its name. Leaving plays it forward from the player's eyes; joining plays it backwards onto the spawn.

# animations/drone.yml
duration-ticks: 50   # length; 20 = 1 second (1-100)
height: 40           # blocks the camera rises (0-512)
radius: 30           # blocks it drifts back behind the starting view; 0 = straight up (0-512)
turns: -0.5          # circles while moving; negative = the other way (-10 to 10)
end-pitch: 35        # where it looks at the top: 90 = straight down, 0 = the horizon (-90 to 90)
shake: 0             # screen shake in degrees, strongest near the ground (0-45)

Then /dc reload and /dc animation leave drone. Keys you leave out use the sky values. Bundled examples: sky (straight up), orbit (spiral around) and shake (straight up with a rumble). More are coming in future updates.

Share good ones: open a pull request adding your file to dawncamera-paper/src/main/resources/animations/.

Building

mvn clean package

The jars are in dawncamera-paper/target/ and dawncamera-velocity/target/. The tests (animation loading and camera maths) run as part of the build.

How it works

The camera is an invisible display entity the player spectates; display entities smooth their own movement on the client, so the pan is fluid at any frame rate. The fade is a black text-display panel in front of the camera that only its owner can see. The proxy holds every server switch, asks the current server to play the leave animation over the dawncamera:main plugin channel, and connects once the server answers (or after 6 seconds). See AnimationManager and DawnCameraVelocity for details.

License

DawnCamera License: free to use and modify on your own servers (including ones that earn money). Selling it, or publishing copies or modified versions, is not allowed without permission from qFane.