How to make Snow in AS

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Poptoogi
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How to make Snow in AS

Post by Poptoogi »

Hi all,

Here is another quick tutorial on how to make snow in AS Pro using particle effects. You just need a version of AS Pro that has particle effects (I can't remember what version it was introduced) and a few minutes to make this effect. It might seem complex but it's really easy to do and easy to alter. If you have any questions just ask! :)

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Poptoogi
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Poptoogi »

Yeah, sooooooo....
Someone pointed out to me only minutes after posting this tutorial that Anime Studio already has a snow preset.......LOL! Whateva! I do what I waoount! :) I'm still going to keep it posted as the one I made kind of explains to users just how an effect like this is made AND it with this video can show you guys that it can be altered with just a few minor adjustments to make it useful for other types of particles. So yeah *cough.....cough* Here is the same animation applied to a burning village picture and the snow flakes are now burning embers. I them by adding random noise to it's position (there is only one flake/ember being used), put a gradient in it, changed the angle of the decent and sped it up a bit for a different look. I also changed the blending mode to ADD so it looks like they are glowing. Hopefully someone will still find this useful! :)

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Poptoogi
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Poptoogi »

Well this is embarrassing......well not really embarrassing more of a revelation to me! LOL! As I've posted a few videos on making particle effects, it has now been brought to my intention (again) that there is also a particle effect for hot ash (like hot embers I made above) also included within Anime Studio! In fact there are DOZENS of awesome, ready to use particle effects located in the library in which people like Victor Paredes, Charles Kenway, DK toons and bunch of others have contributed to!

I honestly didn't realize there was so much pre made content already available in AS and I advise anyone and everyone who doesn't know about it to check out the LIBRARY! Yes, I'm sure most of you are like "Yeah, no @#$. We've been using is all along!" But some newer users may not.

Having said that, I'm still going to make video tutorials that I find useful and if I see or use any techniques already being used in something in AS I'll be sure to reference and give credit to it. I'll continue to make tutorials that I think might be helpful to users so that they understand the process on how the tools and functions of how Anime Studio works so users can create their own effects or helpful tips in the future!

I have never made any money from animation or using Anime Studio or creating tutorials. This community and this forum are great and I just love doing it and AS is so freaking awesome that when I discover how to do something new I want to share!
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Little Yamori
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Little Yamori »

Dude, please keep making these. Your tutorials have helped me a lot. I did the grind watching all sorts of tutorials for my first 2 animations, and what's really superior about yours is that you get straight to helpful points in a very short amount of time. What a lot of tutorial makers don't keep in mind is that often work is being done at 1 AM, and staying up for 15 minutes through a tutorial that doesn't quite get to the heart of the matter quickly is draining, because then you have to watch another, then another, and before you know it it's 2AM, and you've got no energy left to do animation.

I used some rain particles in my second animation "Neko and the Gecko" but was never really satisfied with the default look, so just seeing how to make adjustments to what already exists is a big plus.

So thanks a bunch
Poptoogi
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Poptoogi »

Little Yamori wrote:Dude, please keep making these. Your tutorials have helped me a lot. I did the grind watching all sorts of tutorials for my first 2 animations, and what's really superior about yours is that you get straight to helpful points in a very short amount of time. What a lot of tutorial makers don't keep in mind is that often work is being done at 1 AM, and staying up for 15 minutes through a tutorial that doesn't quite get to the heart of the matter quickly is draining, because then you have to watch another, then another, and before you know it it's 2AM, and you've got no energy left to do animation.

I used some rain particles in my second animation "Neko and the Gecko" but was never really satisfied with the default look, so just seeing how to make adjustments to what already exists is a big plus.

So thanks a bunch
Thank you Little Yamori for the kind words! That is exactly why I'm going to continue to make tutorials. I intentionally try to make my videos short because I ran into the same problem when I first started searching for specific info or tutorials on a specific subject. Sometimes you want to just get to one particular instruction or idea and it gets harder to find the info you want when the videos are really long. If you ever want a video on a specific topic let me know! Even if I don't know how to do it, I'll do my best to figure it out!
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Little Yamori
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Little Yamori »

guyver93 wrote: Thank you Little Yamori for the kind words! That is exactly why I'm going to continue to make tutorials. I intentionally try to make my videos short because I ran into the same problem when I first started searching for specific info or tutorials on a specific subject. Sometimes you want to just get to one particular instruction or idea and it gets harder to find the info you want when the videos are really long. If you ever want a video on a specific topic let me know! Even if I don't know how to do it, I'll do my best to figure it out!
Wow, that's extremely generous of you. I did all my work over the last 3 years in Debut 6 and just got Pro 11, so I'm just getting used to all the new features (and some quirkiness) of the up to date stuff. Lately have been using AS for some static vector graphics that I then convert to Ai for some printing(crazy process), and using the new animated gif feature for a new website, but when I begin my next animated story I may have to take you up on your offer :mrgreen: , I'll keep you posted.....(I promise not to go overboard with requests).
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Little Yamori
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Little Yamori »

Ok here's my first request....

I was messing around with particles, and am having a couple of things go on that I'm not quite sure about. I don't think it's my one second cycle since it's just the wing flaps that are cycled. I'll try re rendering with the 999 duration you mentioned., and also they're all flying sideways, which I'd like to tweak without making them fly upside down.

Anyway, any suggestions would be appreciated

here's what it looks like

Poptoogi
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Poptoogi »

Little Yamori wrote:Ok here's my first request....

I was messing around with particles, and am having a couple of things go on that I'm not quite sure about. I don't think it's my one second cycle since it's just the wing flaps that are cycled. I'll try re rendering with the 999 duration you mentioned., and also they're all flying sideways, which I'd like to tweak without making them fly upside down.

Anyway, any suggestions would be appreciated
Hey LY!
I totally made a mistake when I used 999 frames. I hadn't used particles in awhile and forgot that you just need to set the frames to 0 to have the particles stay on the canvas. If your animation is cycling it should keep them from disappearing.... I think that might help anyway. I think you could make them turn upright if you use 3 layers and a smart bone action. One for each wing and one for the body. I'm working on a body turn tutorial but I'll definitely play around with the idea and get back to you! They look beautiful by the way! The stoping and going movement looks extremely good to me! :)
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Little Yamori
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Little Yamori »

guyver93 wrote:
If your animation is cycling it should keep them from disappearing.... I think that might help anyway.
Hey thanks for checking it out. I messed with the settings and I got a better look with them not being so sideways, but I am having random butterflies disappear and appear in the middle of the animation. I'll try making he entire original single butterfly animation the same length or longer than this one to see if it helps.. but I'm having a hard time experimenting with this particle file since it seems to overloading by processing all the butterflies together, as is becomes unresponsive for as much as 10 seconds or more as I scrub through the time line with adjustments etc... so any ideas to correct the mysterious Hoodini butterflies would help a bunch :D
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Little Yamori
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Re: How to make Snow in AS

Post by Little Yamori »

Making the original File longer did the trick. No more appearing and disappearing butterflies.
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