Animator questions about Animate CC

[rayek.elfin]

So, after Asymetrical​ demonstrating his workflow in Animate CC, I decided to test drive Animate CC once more after years of absence, and I've used other animation software in the past ~10 years, or so. It's part of my CC sub anyway.

Couple of questions after an evening of testing:

1. is it possible to turn off the odd lines while drawing with the Paint Brush Tool? The squiggly lines pattern is very distracting, and doesn't provide a good preview while drawing at all. (the Brush tool generates shapes, which renders it useless for the thickness tool, and is too awkward to edit afterwards). I haven't seen this in any other animation software, and it is a showstopper for me.
2. I am used to selecting a new frame, and begin drawing to create a new keyframe with a new drawing. I could not find a way to convince Animate CC to create a new drawing/cel automatically after selecting a frame in the timeline. It seems I first need to select a frame, then add a blank keyframe first before I am allowed to draw. Can this behaviour be altered? This is a workflow breaker.
3. The onion skinning seems awfully basic to me. After all these years, I would have expected to be able to at least set specific frames - for example, every second frame, and the ability to fix specific frames in the animation (displayed as onion skin at all times, no matter where I am in the timeline). Compared to other animation software, it's rather limiting.
4. Still no X-sheet option? Or timeline printing (pdf)?
5. Bitmap painting tools. Vector drawing tools are great and all, yet certain effects are impossible to pull off without proper bitmap painting tools. After all these years, still missing in action?
6. Sometimes I prefer to work on paper, and scan the drawing, then convert to vector for further adjustments and colouring. Also for quick line tests. Not possible in Animate CC? Any option to scan and/or use a camera/webcam for quick importing of drawings is missing.
7. Timeline control seems limited. No options to work on 2's, 3's, 4's? Or convert existing frames to 2s, etc.? (I saw someone use a script for this?)
8. I noticed no z-index control to control an object's layering relative to other layers and objects?
9. I couldn't find any templates for 4K. Or many other TV/Film standards, for that matter. Can these be downloaded somewhere?
10. No version control?
11. Working with external assets, when updated, can those be automatically updated in Animate CC? Is it possible to work with external assets without the need for the library, or an external library?
12. Any way to add visible notes to the timeline?
13. No effects? No particles? Complete reliance on external compositing and effects software?

So far, not so good. What am I missing here? I am aware AnimateCC/Flash is still used a lot in Western broadcast animation, yet I start wondering why? Because animators have grown so used to it?

I researched plugins for animators as well, but most are paid-for, and it seems strange to me that some very basic functionality is clearly missing for animators. Asymetrical seemed to have a number of plugins installed as well.

Perhaps I am just spoiled by the competition.

Having said all this, it's not all bad: the new frame picker is nice, and the camera can be easily panned now. 3d rotation is nice. And library assets and standardized colour control are good.

Am I alone in saying I hope Adobe will improve Animate CC for animators? Sorry for my complaining. To be fair, I am used to other animation software, and Flash seems to missing very basic features compared. Please view these as constructive pointers for the Animate CC devs.

[RandomlyFish · Accepted solution]

1. I don't think so, but I could be wrong.

2. You can press F7 to insert a blank keyframe after your last one. F5 extends the keyframe and F6 duplicates it.

3. While I get it isn't an ideal solution, you could create a new layer and paste some of the keyframes that you want.

4. Not a thing in Animate as far as I know.

5. Animate does only have tools for vector drawing.

6. You can if you select a bitmap and go to Modify > Bitmap > Trace Bitmap. However the results aren't always the best. For scanning, there's Adobe Capture for iOS and Android.

7. If you want your entire animation to run on 2's, you can drop the frame rate from 24 to 12.

8. Not sure what you mean. If you want to change the order of the layers, you can drag and drop them.

9. You can just create the animation at the aspect ratio that you want and then export a 4K version, that's the nice thing about vectors.

10. This may be what you're looking for: Flash Professional Help | Working with uncompressed XFL files and source control

11. I don't think that's possible aside from loading assets through code at run time.

12. You can turn a layer into a guide layer making things on the layer only visible to you while working on it.

13. There are effects that you can apply to symbols and if you're working in an Actionscript project, they can also be applied to texts without converting them to symbols. To convert something to a symbol, select any drawing, right click on it and select convert to symbol, or press F8. The filters can then be found in the properties panel, if you have the symbol selected.

It may seem very primitive, but being able to create nested animations inside nested animations using symbols, is something I feel makes it very powerful.

[rayek.elfin]

Thanks, RandomlyFish​. Helpful answers. I was aware of some of the answers based on an older version of Flash, but was hoping that certain things would have been improved by now. The paint brush tool behaviour is plain silly. Let's hope that will be resolved in an upcoming version - it makes me wonder how animators have put with that throughout the years.

Dropping the framerate to 12 to work on 2s is not quite a solution. Suppose a camera pan is done on 24fps, and the character is animated on 2s? I did see a script a while ago that took care of this in Animate CC, as far as I can recall.

Found it: Flash Extensions I don't have time to test this now, but will this week.

The trace bitmap option is useless for real work. In the competition scanned drawings and bitmap line art can be converted to single curves with a custom thickness setting.

Colin Holgate​ Interesting development! Looking at the current version Adobe really lags behind the competition in as far as functionality for animators goes. I did notice a slight improvement, so it is good to hear they are finally going to address this. Thanks for the heads-up. While the current release can't cater to my needs, I am keeping an eye out for the next versions.

ClayUUID​ Well, your derogatory comments aren't very helpful at all, and it seems you lack any knowledge of how traditional animators (not "cartoonists") work. In other animation software I can just click on a frame, and start drawing; which sets an automatic keyframe. No magic there, me thinks. Just a quicker and more flexible workflow option. "Quaint pre-digital ways"? I and my colleagues work in all sorts of animation, VFX, 3D animation, etc. software, and drawing on paper still is, and will always be, the best way to communicate visual ideas and do quick sequences of line tests. Other animation software supports a paper workflow that recognizes that need. Animate CC doesn't. Simple as that.

[_keyframer]

Just a slight clarification to #13. Filtered bitmap effects can be applied to symbols but more specifically Movie Clip symbols. Graphic symbols will not provide filters as an option.

[rayek.elfin]

_keyframer  wrote

Just a slight clarification to #13. Filtered bitmap effects can be applied to symbols but more specifically Movie Clip symbols. Graphic symbols will not provide filters as an option.

Yes, I noticed this as well. Weird, because only graphic symbols play their nested timelines in the preview. I suppose parts of the animation could be exported to After Effects or Fusion - but it is a bit of a hassle. Competing animation software offers built-in nodal compositing, which makes things easier.

[Colin Holgate]

MovieClips play their nested timeline when doing a Test Movie. If you need to scrub around a lot while getting the basic animation working, set the symbol to be a Graphic. Then when you're happy with it you can change it MovieClip and add the filters.

[rayek.elfin]

I know - the funny thing is that I used to work as a Flash developer 15 years ago. Between then and now I switched to animation/3d/VFX (still am a web dev), and learned to work in other animation software. Always had Flash/Animate CC alongside the other Adobe software, but never touched it (did not even install it).

Asymetrical's animation work got me interested again, and I am evaluating Animate CC once again - but seen from the point of view as a 2d animator. Funny how things work out.

I am thankful for all the answers. For now, I will continue to keep a watchful eye out for future Animate CC developments. It seems the Animate CC devs/management finally woke up a bit, and is intending to improve the 2d animation tools. It would be great if I could export animations directly to Canvas - something not supported in (most) other animation software. The current state of Animate CC is not quite convincing enough to make it part of my pipeline (again). But perhaps in a couple of years? We'll see.

[Asymetrical]

Hey Rayek, sorry I didn't see this before now... It seems most of your questions were answered by RandomlyFish already but I want to mention something about the Brush tool.  Animate has TWO Brush tools, one is called The Paint Brush which is only really good for Cleanup and even then only if you use the option Draw As Fill. the second one is called the Brush tool which is what you saw me demonstrating Animate and it is primarily what I draw with.

As for the other thoughts, yes I do use quite a bit of extensions but most of them aren't easy to find. I can send them to you if you like. Send an email to mike@milowerx.com and I'll send you what I have. Here's a list of some of the one's I typically use.

As for 4k I don't typically use something that large but it's very easy to create your own templates in Animate. All you have to do is make the file the size you want by right clicking on the Stage and selecting Document then resizing the stage there. Once you've done that you can go to File/Save as Template and then you'll see it when you start up Animate.

As for an X-Sheet option I really don't find the need for it but I could imagine you wanting one. Look at the timeline as an x-sheet sideways and maybe that will help. that's what i do. I agree about the Onion skinning tool though, we use Storyboard Pro and Harmony at work lately and they both have this option and i miss it in Animate. One of the reasons I joined the beta program was to get my ideas implemented into animate and so far it's actually helped. The developers truly do listen to ideas, but of course they can't implement everything so fast. Some of the stuff you've mentioned is in development but as Colin said we can't speak about them publicly. You should join the beta team and help Animate get better.

As for updating assets yes you can actually edit with Photoshop and anything you save will be updated in Animate as well. It only works on bitmaps and psd files but to do that simply right click on the file in the Library and select edit with Photoshop

Sadly, there is no versioning by default but you can make that happen via a little plugin caned Save version made by Cloud Kid

Save Version | CloudKid

As for particles, there used to be a feature in Flash CS6 called the Deco tool which touched on particles but when they switched to Flash CC they got rid of some features since they rebuilt the app from the ground up to get rid of the Macromedia code. I have heard it will come back at some point but in the meantime what I do is just open CS 6 and make the particles in there and then bring them to Animate. With Adobe Manager you can download previous versions of Adobe software. Is it elegant? No but it's a solution.

Oh and don't be put off by Clay's gruffness, he means well, he's a good dude and it's just how he's built. The guy knows his stuff though let me tell you!

[_keyframer]

Nice post Mike!

[_keyframer]

Yeah - I agree 100%

[ClayUUID]

rayek.elfin  wrote

I am used to selecting a new frame, and begin drawing to create a new keyframe with a new drawing. I could not find a way to convince Animate CC to create a new drawing/cel automatically after selecting a frame in the timeline. It seems I first need to select a frame, then add a blank keyframe first before I am allowed to draw. Can this behaviour be altered? This is a workflow breaker.

Your complaint seems to be that Animate can't read your mind. If you want a new keyframe, of course you have to tell it that.

If you know in advance that you're going to be drawing a sequence of images, just select that span of the timeline and hit F6 or F7 to turn them all into keyframes at once.

[Colin Holgate]

I can't tell you which numbers they are, but a few of your list of features are already working internally, and the world will see them in the near future.

The general case is that currently Adobe are doing a lot in Animate to help animators.

[ClayUUID]

Well, cartoonists. They seem to have their own quaint pre-digital ways of doing things.

[rayek.elfin]

ClayUUID  wrote

Well, cartoonists. They seem to have their own quaint pre-digital ways of doing things.

ClayUUID​ I apologize for my rather harsh response earlier. Based on Mike's answer I may have misread your intent, and taken your answer too seriously. And I am definitely a 'quaint' personality.

Text is so limiting and the intent often hard to measure without someone's body language and facial expressions.

Asymetrical​ Thank you for your answer. I sent you an email. Very curious now!

Versioning for me goes a little deeper than an autosave with auto-incrementing. I guess it is related to how Animate CC saves all assets and the animation in one file (well, libraries are an option): in another animation app all assets are kept separate, and the animation files themselves are pretty much just text files, which makes it easy to use SVN (directly supported) or just Git/Github. Change one asset, and it updates in all animation timelines. I am aware that libraries in Animate CC can update assets, although it is not as quick or flexible.