Character Animator to Animator Workflow

[michelles87035016]

Hi. I've seen other questions similar to this but not exactly. I'm used to using Adobe Animator to create animations, but I'd like to use puppets made and recorded in Character Animator in order to speed up the process. Is there an easy way for me to record a puppet speaking and moving in Ch and then incorporate that into An? I've tried exporting the puppet as a PNG Sequence and WAV, but the quality isn't great when I import it into An - plus I would have thought that loading a four-minute animation with hundreds of PNGs would become unwieldy. I'd be happy to create the whole animation in Ch, but there doesn't seem to be any way of animating anything other than the character (fair enough in an application called Character Animator).

There looks to be a new export option that allows export to After Effects or Premiere Pro, but they don't seem to be animation apps like An is. Am I trying to do something that Ch is just not designed for?

Thanks.

[alank99101739]

You can export a video from CH, including one with Alpha channels (transparency) - “QuickTime GoPro CineForm RGB with Alpha”.

But maybe you could describe the animation you are trying to do in An to see if there is a good way in Ch?  You can animate movements of any “puppet” (which is just a separate artwork file - does not have to be a person - e.g. I animate soccer balls or furniture at times.). AE can also do keyframing etc.  It really depends what you are trying to do.

[michelles87035016]

The only format option I can see for video export in Ch is H.264. How do I get the option you mentioned? Also, I can't see a way of playing video in An.

The animation I'm doing is quite simple. It's just a snowy scene with a couple of characters talking. But now and again they interact with the snow and with a sheep. Do people create Flash-type animations in Ae? I thought it was for embellishing video.

[alank99101739]

I have no experience with flash or using Ch with flash. I have only done video. I have not heard anything of people using them together.

If you export via media encoder, you can change the format In media encoder before starting the render. (Yes, it asks to save in mp4 first. Just accept that, then change later in the Media encoder.) Not intuitive, but it does work.

[michelles87035016]

Ok. I've had a look at Okay Samurai's Feb and March Hints and Tips videos and they show the workflow between Ch and Ae. I'll give it a go. Thanks for your help.

[mark@headTrix]

Hi there,

Animate is a Vector animation program. It was created as Flash for small fast running animation on the web. Now used for banners, apps, games, etc. But it can also include video, but it might be tough to sync up your video animation to your Animate animation.

First off, there is a new tutorial that shows using Physics with snow or rain https://youtu.be/T-7uTIfXW8E​ (Time 8:10).

As a long time Flash user (now called Animate CC) I just recently started animating in After Effects and I love it!

It is a lot more powerful, I think it animates faster and easier, and has a big WOW factor that Animate does not have, with the exception of the great vector drawing tools in Animate. The keyframing is similar, it uses "composites" just like symbols/instances in Animate, but it also has tons of filters and effects like Photoshop does but with movement! It can also do 3D, camera fly thru's, keying(dropping out video backgrounds, masking, text effects (and so many other effects, visual effects, etc), and it dynamically links with Character Animator which is a HUGE time saver. I can also animate characters in After Effects using the puppet pin tool (similar to Photoshop if you have used it).

Another thing that is amazing with After Effects and Character Animator, is that you can dynamically link your Character Animator file into After Effects so if you have to go back and update your animation in Character Animator, it updates in After Effects.... without any rendering or exporting! And what's even more amazing... if you update your Character in Photoshop, it in turn updates you Character Animator (this you already know) but it will then also update everything in After Effects! Save once in Photoshop, and boom your entire presentation in After Effects is updated, just by clicking SAVE in Photoshop(Ps)! WOW! You can even load Character Animator(Ch) into Premiere (Pr) and the Pr into After Effects(Ae).... and again updating the Ps file would update the Ch file which would update the Pr file which will update your Ae file!! No rendering, no exporting and importing, just ONE simple SAVE!

check it out! I think you might LOVE It!

Hope this helps!

cheers,
Mark