Ray Mairlot shows how to create an animated zipper in Blender, that can be animated to either open or close. Here, Ray uses the zipper open effect as a convincing animated reveal for some text.
In this video tutorial I take you through the steps of how to create a zipper that can be animated to open and close
Ray shows how to create a rig for the zipper animation, and also how it can be controlled, but also explains some of the drawbacks and disadvantages of using this method, noting that it would be impossible to create a zip in a curve shape, here the tutorial is just opening and closing on a straight trajectory. Ray also shows how to create the model for the zipper, and uses multiple UV maps to create the stitched cloth textures. [via blendernation]