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Participant
March 24, 2017
Answered

Digital colouring book for IPad or PC

  • March 24, 2017
  • 1 reply
  • 661 views

I am adult colouring book author taking the next step....Looking for software for creating a  digital colouring book, on PC or Apple products.

[Since this is about creating an app, and not about animating anything, I've moved this thread out of Animation tips and tricks​ and into a (hopefully) more appropriate forum - moderator]

    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Correct answer Colin Holgate

    The easiest way to take a JPEG and draw on it, and then save an image that is the combination of the two, would be to have a movieclip where the JPEG is already there, or you can add the JPEG with code. Once you have that you would create a sprite or movieclip to sit on top of that, and that's the object you would draw into. At the end you would be able to convert the movieclip that holds both the JPEG and your doodling into a single image.

    Analysing the JPEG to recognise areas would be very tough. If you want a paint by numbers drawing tool you would manually create all of the areas you want to be colored in, and each one would be a movieclip with just that area as a white shape. You can then either use that shape as a mask layer and doodle under it, making sure the user draws within the lines, or you could tint the shape to get the whole area to fill in at once. That's the approach I've taken with my apps.

    One thing to note, you can't just load a JPEG from anywhere in the world and expect to draw on top of it and to save a copy of the results, because of security issues. If you do want to load in JPEGs from outside they would need to be on your own server.

    1 reply

    Colin Holgate
    Inspiring
    March 24, 2017

    Do you know the nature of coloring book you want to do? That is, is it to bee freeform scribbling for older kids, or more paint by numbers for younger kids?

    If you search for Meet Heckerty in the various app stores you can see how I did a paint by numbers kind of coloring book. I can tell you how to do any type of coloring book, but have a look at one of the Heckerty apps to see if how I did it makes sense for you.

    Participant
    March 25, 2017

    Thanks for the help. I am looking to colour on the pages of the tablet, a software that can change a jpeg into writeable ((colour the illustration)

    Colin Holgate
    Colin HolgateCorrect answer
    Inspiring
    March 25, 2017

    The easiest way to take a JPEG and draw on it, and then save an image that is the combination of the two, would be to have a movieclip where the JPEG is already there, or you can add the JPEG with code. Once you have that you would create a sprite or movieclip to sit on top of that, and that's the object you would draw into. At the end you would be able to convert the movieclip that holds both the JPEG and your doodling into a single image.

    Analysing the JPEG to recognise areas would be very tough. If you want a paint by numbers drawing tool you would manually create all of the areas you want to be colored in, and each one would be a movieclip with just that area as a white shape. You can then either use that shape as a mask layer and doodle under it, making sure the user draws within the lines, or you could tint the shape to get the whole area to fill in at once. That's the approach I've taken with my apps.

    One thing to note, you can't just load a JPEG from anywhere in the world and expect to draw on top of it and to save a copy of the results, because of security issues. If you do want to load in JPEGs from outside they would need to be on your own server.