Help Shape the Future of Anime Studio

[dkwroot]

Here is an extremely important update that we need:
-- Add the ability to keyframe Style changes. This is a big deal for using layer referencing efficiently.

Are you talking about the "Style 1" and "Style 2" dropdowns or style properties?

The drop downs. If you know of a way to animate this or a work around, let me know.

[chucky]

Pnysmasher,
with smart bone actions and references.
Have you tried going to your arm layer and changing the name of the action to the name of the new bones?

[synthsin75]

Here is an extremely important update that we need:
-- Add the ability to keyframe Style changes. This is a big deal for using layer referencing efficiently.

Are you talking about the "Style 1" and "Style 2" dropdowns or style properties?

The drop downs. If you know of a way to animate this or a work around, let me know.

What I would do is create a smart bone action that animates the style properties. Every reference would have the same "set" of predefined style keyframes that could be unlinked as needed. May not suit whatever you have in mind though.

[dkwroot]

Yes, I considered using smartbones, it was actually the first solution that came to mind. The problem is that adding more and more smartbone actions in order to accommodate different colors for different characters becomes unreasonable once the project reaches a certain size. I mean, the idea would be sound for things like changing a uniform to 5 variant colors, but it quickly becomes a little crazy when you think about using it to control all the variation in skin, hair, eyes and so on.

[wizaerd]

I'm fairly certain this has been asked for, maybe even many, many times... but by adding another request for it would show greater support, right? So I'd like a UI overhaul to be more tablet friendly. The cursors are to small, the buttons are too small, I haven't quite figured out how to do hotkey combinations yet... I had hoped to be able to work on the couch with this app, but it's not looking too good right now.

[synthsin75]

Yes, I considered using smartbones, it was actually the first solution that came to mind. The problem is that adding more and more smartbone actions in order to accommodate different colors for different characters becomes unreasonable once the project reaches a certain size. I mean, the idea would be sound for things like changing a uniform to 5 variant colors, but it quickly becomes a little crazy when you think about using it to control all the variation in skin, hair, eyes and so on.

As long as you are using references, you just keep adding new style keyframes to ONE style smart bone action. Then each reference can use a different SB angle to select its style. Could even use timeline markers to name each style keyframe. Just some ideas.

[dkwroot]

Microsoft has just licensed the name "Windows 365" which is pretty much confirmation that they're going toward a subscription service. I can barely contain my rage at the idea of a subscription service operating system, but I'm going to try my absolute best to keep my cool.

I know that Anime Studio supported Linux in the past, but stopped because of low sales. Well, Ubuntu has made a lot of progress with Linux and given the future of Windows, I think a LOT of people are going to be jumping to Linux for the first time very soon. I believe that it's time Anime Studio made a build for Linux again in an effort to seize this rare opportunity. If Anime Studio crossed to Ubuntu, you'd be the only mature 2d animation program on their platform making you the go-to program for any animators coming from Windows.

Valve is bringing gaming to Linux, I believe it would be wise for Anime Studio to follow their lead on this one.

[slowtiger]

TVPaint is on Linux and Android, in addition to mac and win.

[dkwroot]

TVPaint is on Linux and Android, in addition to mac and win.

I should have been more specific. I was referring to vector cutout animation. Anime Studio and TVPaint don't really compete in the same animation category.

[synthsin75]

I will NEVER pay to keep my computer running. That is ridiculous.

[dkwroot]

I will NEVER pay to keep my computer running. That is ridiculous.

My theory is that Microsoft is planning to apply their Xbox marketing strategy to the PC. With an Xbox, you can always access the very basic features of the console, but if you want to do things like access the internet or play network games, you have to buy a gold subscription. Believe it or not, a lot of gamers are gullible enough to actually pay this ransom fee to access basic hardware features.

When Microsoft Office went subscription, a lot of people said that they would lose money and that companies would ditch them. Instead, a lot of companies adopted the subscription and now it's making MS a lot in revenue. It would seem that Microsoft is pushing this tactic onto their PC branch, because it worked for their console and office software. I think they are going to have a very different experience this time around...

Not to sound all the alarms, but I think you guys should know that Windows 10 apparently does NOT give the user the ability to disable updates. This means that the software will update on its own without your consent, just like console software. This means that Microsoft can push whatever software they want onto your computer and force you to accept their terms or get locked from your PC. This has already happened with Xbox, so there is no reason this won't happen for PC.

Microsoft thinks that they can strong arm the world into this subscription nonsense and I think it's time to start looking at alternatives. We need to start pushing Linux on the devs because I don't see Microsoft backing down from this subscription idea.

[Greenlaw]

Hi,

Today I revisited the high-density screen issue I mentioned a couple of weeks ago (specifically the Wacom Cintiq Companion 2 screen, which is a 13 inch screen with a pixel resolution of 2560 x 1440.) Currently, the ASP color palette is displayed at about 1-inch in width, so each color tile swatch is only about a sixteenth of an inch wide. Needless to say, this makes it very tricky to use without clicking on the wrong color.

So I thought, okay, since the palette art is basically a .png image file, maybe all I need to do is scale it up. I made a copy of the basic colors palette and scaled it up 200%, which would make it just about right for this screen. Unfortunately, ASP 11 seems to have a fixed palette display size regardless of the size of the image file, and the result is still a palette that is only about an inch wide.

Is there a way to change this in the UI, that is, make ASP use a larger sized image for palettes? For that matter, I'd like to do the same for the tool icons and transport controls--they all display extremely tiny on this screen unless I lower the resolution, and I don't really want to do that.

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

G.

[Greenlaw]

Ugh. I gave up and just reduced the Wacom Cintiq Companion 2's screen's res from 2560 x 1440 to 1920 x 1080. Quick followup:

Programs not specifically designed for high density screens work much better at a lower res on this tablet computer, including ASP 11 which seems to be partially ready for small high density screens but not all of its UI elements (like the color palette mentioned above) scale up properly. At the lower res, it's fine though. The program that's much worse with high density screens is Adobe Photoshop CC 2014, which is almost completely useable when the Companion's screen set at maximum resolution. But at 1920 x 1080, it's also fine.

Reducing the screen resolution is probably just as well. At the maximum resolution, I'm finding that the Wacom tablet computer really sucks battery power. Plus, I'm usually animating at 720p anyway, so resolutions above 1920 x 1080 is probably overkill.

In time, I imagine all programs will become smarter about small high density screens as tablet computers like the Wacom Cintiq Companion 2 and MS Surfarce Pro gain in popularity. I hope that happens sooner than later.

G.

[dkwroot]

-- Add the ability to bind a bone in a child bone layer to a bone in a parent bone layer. The child bone would then adopt all of the parent bone properties such as location/rotation/scale. This would make building character body parts in separate files and assembling them easier.

[dkwroot]

Here is a really big one!

-- Import Vectors as Images. The current vector conversion system is terrible, but there is a simple solution. Just allow the user to import their svg and ai files into anime studio and render them in their native format. This means that there is no conversion to anime studio's curve system so there shouldn't be any random crashes or buggy issues. The catch all would be that the imported vector file would behave just like an imported image file, so the user wouldn't be able to modify the svg or ai file in AS.

I think this is a huge issue, because a LOT of people switching to AS come from programs that use bezier curves. These people and studios have a lot of vector resources built up that they want to import over to AS. AS doesn't want to use bezier curves, but needs to accommodate people who do. I think this would be a fantastic compromise.


-- Add the ability to import SWF files using the method I mentioned above. This would make workflow between Anime Studio and Flash insanely efficient. I think this would be the kind of hook that a lot of people are looking for. They can start experimenting with AS while using Flash as a crutch. As they get more familiar with AS, they'll rely on Flash less and less.