Keeping triggers after editing example puppets

Report · Mar 11, 2020

Hi there,

We have been using Ch with students in a computer art class and they have been using the example Chloe puppet because she already has her triggers, they edit in photoshop and it is fine in character, but if saved differently or closed and opened again, the triggers disappear. Is there a way to keep these saved on the character? Thanks!

Report · Mar 12, 2020

It sounds like your students might be re-importing the Chloe.psd file, is that correct? If so, Triggers are created inside of Character Animator and are preserved when you export a .puppet file. You can work with the existing Chole.puppet, edit the PSD, then keep working on that puppet. You could always change the name, then export a new version of the puppet.

You can actually create triggers inside of an art file by putting a keyboard shortcut in parenthesis next to a layer name. This will create a trigger inside of CH if done properly, but it's a limited workflow. For example, if you had a character with two hands, "Left Hand" and "Left Hand_Flipped" You could name them like this in PS:

"Left Hand (l)"

"Left Hand_flipped (f)"

I recommend doing the above and creating all of your Triggers and Swap Sets inside of CH and preserving them with your .puppet file.