How to create a Animated Block Entity

This page will not cover how to code a Block Entity from the ground up, only how to add the required Azurelib code for the animations and model to work.

Needed Steps in Block Entity class

To start, you must implement GeoBlockEntity

Override getAnimatableInstanceCache and registerControllers

Instantiate a new AnimatableInstanceCache via AzureLibUtil.createInstanceCache(this) at the top of your entity class and return it in getAnimatableInstanceCache

private final AnimatableInstanceCache cache = AzureLibUtil.createInstanceCache(this);

@Override
public AnimatableInstanceCache getAnimatableInstanceCache() {
    return cache;
}

Add any controllers you want for animations in registerControllers

@Override
public void registerControllers(ControllerRegistrar controllers) {
	controllers.add(new AnimationController<>(this, "controllerName", 0, event ->
	{
		return event.setAndContinue( RawAnimation.begin().thenLoop("idle"));
	}));
}

Needed Steps in the Block class

By default, Minecraft will search for a blockstate file in your assets folder to figure out how to render your block. Since the AzureLib renderer doesn't render based on a blockstate, we need to tell the game not to bother looking.

To do this, we need to override getRenderShape in our block and return the ENTITYBLOCK_ANIMATED type.

@Override
public RenderShape getRenderShape(BlockState state) {
    return RenderShape.ENTITYBLOCK_ANIMATED;
}

Creating the model class

Create a new class that extends GeoModel, then implement all the required methods:

public class ExampleBlockModel extends GeoModel<ExampleBlockEntity> {
// Models must be stored in assets/<modid>/geo with subfolders supported inside the geo folder
	private static final ResourceLocation model = new ResourceLocation("yournamespace", "geo/yourmodel.geo.json");
// Textures must be stored in assets/<modid>/textures with subfolders supported inside the textures folder
	private static final ResourceLocation texture = new ResourceLocation("yournamespace", "textures/<modeltype>/yourtexture.png");
// Animations must be stored in assets/<modid>/animations with subfolders supported inside the animations folder
	private static final ResourceLocation animation = new ResourceLocation("yournamespace", "animations/youranimation.animation.json");

	@Override
	public ResourceLocation getModelResource(ExampleBlockEntity object) {
		return this.model;
	}

	@Override
	public ResourceLocation getTextureResource(ExampleBlockEntity object) {
		return this.texture;
	}

	@Override
	public ResourceLocation getAnimationResource(ExampleBlockEntity object) {
		return this.animation;
	}
}

Creating the renderer class

Create a class that extends GeoBlockRenderer, then just set it like so:

public class ExampleBlockEntityRenderer extends GeoBlockRenderer<ExampleBlockEntity>{
    public ExampleBlockEntityRenderer() {
        super(new ExampleBlockModel());
    }
}

You will then need to register this class as you would any other renderer, depending on your modloader methods.