The sad thing is that on discovery of this problem my director is opting not to use AS for an upcoming project. He simply needs to have the ability to say to an animator "make that section that a bit faster/slower, take out these keyframes...etc" with almost immediate results that he can see, without any fiddly or time consuming workarounds.
This is of fundamental importance to an animation program, and as much as I love AS im inclined to agree with him....
Shifting Keyframes through all layers...
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
It depends on the amount of preparation done before animation wether AS works or not. We have a detailed Leicareel right now and all scenes lengths timed to the frame. Together with the dialogue this makes for a pretty rigid corset to work within. Since there is agreement over how fast a head turn should be there isn't much re-timing necessary.
I don't care what type of software you use or how "easy" it is to change the timing... if you have someone over your shoulder saying "tweak this" and "change that" you are going to end up running over budget or under schedule.
If it's too easy to change then it will be changed... and often. Quite honestly it isn't THAT hard to make key frame changes in AS... yeah it is a bit of effort but seriously...
... what program will you be using instead of AS? Flash?!
Keep in mind what ever you use instead will have its own problems and trade offs.
Just an opinion.
-vern
If it's too easy to change then it will be changed... and often. Quite honestly it isn't THAT hard to make key frame changes in AS... yeah it is a bit of effort but seriously...
... what program will you be using instead of AS? Flash?!
Keep in mind what ever you use instead will have its own problems and trade offs.
Just an opinion.
-vern
Welcome to my world Vern...... if you have someone over your shoulder saying "tweak this" and "change that" you are going to end up running over budget or under schedule.
Yeah I agree with you, and believe me I'm battling for us to use AS, like I said I love the program.
I have stated that it is imperitive to us that a thoroughly detailed animatic is produced because, as Slowtiger says, it will greatly help with timing issues.
I still think it would greatly help AS's cause if people could see an easy way to make timing changes through multiple layers (and it is that hard to be able to rescale keyframes, in fact its impossible!), right now im sure its putting more people off than just my director.
Changing the timing was never the easiest thing, but depending on how much of a change was asked for different techniques were differently labourious.
Drawn animation is kind of easy this way. Throw out a bunch of drawings, re-number others or change the X-sheet - done.
I'd like to have a bitmap animation software with an X-sheet view of the timeline, so changes like this could be done as elegantly. Mirage sucks in this respect, but I hope for the next version.
If a character consists of several timelines, then it is harder to change the timing in AS than it is with drawings.
OTOH AS has advantages in the case only one part of the body needs to be adjusted, as long as this body part has its own timeline.
Drawn animation is kind of easy this way. Throw out a bunch of drawings, re-number others or change the X-sheet - done.
I'd like to have a bitmap animation software with an X-sheet view of the timeline, so changes like this could be done as elegantly. Mirage sucks in this respect, but I hope for the next version.
If a character consists of several timelines, then it is harder to change the timing in AS than it is with drawings.
OTOH AS has advantages in the case only one part of the body needs to be adjusted, as long as this body part has its own timeline.