Does anyone use Retas Studio?

[slowtiger]

JetT:
From your in-depth description of the colouring process I could whip up a workflow in TVPaint as easy as this. All the elements are there, you just need to know how to use the program. Keywords: preserve transparency and colour lines, automatically fill display/above, and of course use different layers. Believe me, it's not the software doing the trick, since we did self-ink lines and shadows and all that stuff on paper/cel in the 90's without any problem. And that was the time when you had to do separate passes under the camera for a shadow or a highlight!

BasementProductions:

I tried AS once and didn't like it, mainly because of the interface. It was very cluttered with features and was too heavy for my machine

You're the first person I know who preferred the Blender interface to AS. I have the opposite experience, AS running on everything including my toaster, and being simple enough my 82 yr old father could use it.

[basementProductions]

ahahah
That made my day, sir!

I see, who knew toasters had advanced so far... maybe I could do with a replacement!

Actually, I don't really like blender's interface over Anime Studio's, it was just that I was introduced to it better than I was to AS'.
I'm sure my current machine could operate AS alright, but it seemed sluggish on the old.
I might actually take the whole statement back, as I haven't picked up AS in quite a while, and I may be more receptive to it, now.

Since there are worries of the thread being taken over by a foreign software, maybe a side by side workflow comparison between AS, Retas, and TVPaint is in order? I'm not sure if I can contribute anything further...

[JetT]

From your in-depth description of the colouring process I could whip up a workflow in TVPaint as easy as this. All the elements are there, you just need to know how to use the program. Keywords: preserve transparency and colour lines, automatically fill display/above, and of course use different layers.

Slowtiger, could you be so kind as to write up a more detailed process? I'm very interested. I gave it a shot but I might be missing something as it got quite fiddly, but the result was good. Am I right in thinking you fill the area and then fill the line? To give you a super short description of what Retas does, when you click to fill an area and you have any of those colored boxes ticked it will replace that colored line at the same time with your fill color, all in one click. If TVP can do that then Retas becomes redundant.

Am I mistaken for thinking you are a beta tester of TVP Slowtiger? If so could you perhaps give the guys at TVP a nudge on this feature?

At this point, both you and Jet appear to be spammers for Retas. Whether you are or not, certainly you could find a better place to discuss that software with more people who use it.

What is that even supposed to be? Highlighting what Retas does better than anyone else is a good thing as long as developers are listening, usually noone talks about this feature because like basementProductions described it, grunt work is outsourced, you don't usually have to worry about it, there is a bunch of people on slave wages ready to render out your idea in another country somewhere so people like Disney CEO Bob Iger can take home his $60 million bonus.

[slowtiger]

Speaking as a moderator:
I think this thread is totally OK, since it's hard to find any insightful comparison of different software this sub-forum seems to be the right place for it. I've learned a lot alreaday.

[slowtiger]

JetT:
TVPaint workflow just tested, it goes like this:
1. Draw line art.
2. New layer under this, draw shadow lines in whatever color you like.
3. Same for highlights.
4. New layer under this, for color. Switch off shadow and highlight line layers. Use Fill tool with good settings for expand and gap close. Use mode "above" so it fills within the line art of the top layer.
5. Switch on and select shadow layer, use fill tool.
6. Same with highlight layer.
7. Set shadow and highlight layers to "preserve transparency". Use rectangle tool to fill with shadow and highlight color. This step can be done for a whole layer at once, and you can use it to change the shadow color completely even later.

This is the workflow in version 10. In version 11 they introduced a new fill tool with even more options, but I haven't tested it yet. And I'm sure parts of this might even get scripted.

[basementProductions]

I think this thread is totally OK, since it's hard to find any insightful comparison of different software this sub-forum seems to be the right place for it. I've learned a lot alreaday.

Thank you, slowtiger, I really appreciate that, and am glad to hear others are getting something out of my very first thread, though that probably doesn't have much to do with me

you don't usually have to worry about it, there is a bunch of people on slave wages ready to render out your idea in another country somewhere so people like Disney CEO Bob Iger can take home his $60 million bonus.

umm, wow. I guess I shouldn't be surprised though, and having assimilated Marvel and Lucas films, I wouldn't doubt he makes his goal either.

...TVPaint workflow just tested, it goes like this:...

Sounds pretty straight forward, I'm pretty sure you can do that much in AS, but I haven't used it in a while.
Could you possibly link pictures of the lineart with markup and the completed image?

[slowtiger]

What you don't see in this size: I've used a fuzzy pencil line which gets colored correctly down to the last pixel.

[basementProductions]

Wow, cool, and how long did it take to do that from outline to the final painting, including markup?

[JetT]

That's awesome slowtiger. From doing it, it is still one step too many compared to Retas, but it's two steps less than what I was doing before using TVP and how people keep telling me to do it.

How did you setup the shadow area? did you fill it in with the same color blue to create a mask first or did you just color with your shadow color?

Here's my go at your method:

Lineart/Separation Lines/Shade Map


Color flats


Shadow Mask


Activate All Layers / Change Shadow Mask to a Warm Red / Set Shadow Mask to Sub Mode


Despite a few unfilled gaps I had to fill, that was pretty quick.

[slowtiger]

I just colored the shadow with a darker skin tone. But you may as well use black or dark blue and a combination of layer opacity and layer blend mode (multiply, or one of the other - TVP has a great choice). As I said, you can always change stuff even later in production, which is perfect for my way of doing things.

As for the small gaps: if I remember correctly there was a solution posted in the TVP forum not long ago - some script.

[basementProductions]

I am really impressed with the ease of separations and fills TVPaint provides and all, and it seems very comparable to Retas, but $1400?? This seems quite steep, to me.

Which reminds me; if anyone has tried or is thinking of trying the Huion generic pen tablets, make sure you have an extra pen lined up, after only a few careless falls, mine has developed a crack down the side of the barrel/battery housing. Another will take 2 weeks to arrive and I'm not entirely sure whether this one will hold up with 3M tape around it. At least they are only $5, I couldn't imagine replacing a Wacom pen...

[slowtiger]

That's the price for the Pro version with all the bells and whistles. You can work with Debut as well, it doesn't have the camera tool or the multiplane tool and only loads 1 soundfile per project, but since you have AS and a video editor this is not a problem at all. I do my camera moves in AS anyway.

[synthsin75]

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for an honest comparison, but when you say you've basically written off the software that this forum is made for (or seem too married to one software, to the exclusion of considering others that do the exact same thing), that doesn't seem like an honest comparison to me.

[basementProductions]

Ah sorry, no, no video or AS, yet. I have tried it before, not yet purchased, nor have I purchased Retas, only looking at trial version. and I'd admit to trying the "free" cs2 AE before I buy it, but I don't want to be litigated to death by Adobe.

I am really new to animation in general, I have looked over a couple books, shopped for software and equipment, that's all at this point. What I do have is GIMP, Blender, my trusty homemade aluminum pegbar, and limited-feature trial-Retas

And no, I haven't written off AS totally yet, I just don't think I want to pay $300 for a software that does so many things that I don't think I really need.
Also I have yet to see a serious, lengthy production created in AS, though I know a lot of you guys use it in professional work all the time.

I would like to see how AS can do all of these things TVPaint and Retas can do, if it really can.
I don't speak for everyone, but the big draw of FBF for me is how easily you can add effects and morph objects if you have the skill of rendering; and drawing the frames by hand seems like it's more natural than joining shapes.

[slowtiger]

Choice of tools should only depend on your choice of style. I use AS and TVP because they're a perfect match for my needs, which cover a broader range of styles. Retas would be much too restrictive for me. OTOH, I could easily create "anime" characters both in As and TVP if a client would ever ask for that.