Hand drawn animation

[Masna]

I wanted to know if you could hand draw an animation then use animation master to play them like a flip book.

[johnl3d]

You could after you scanned them in as a numbered sequence imported that sequence and convert it to a quicktime or whatever but there are other programs that would do that also.

[Paul Forwood]

If you create a sequence of targa images and name them with sequential names, such as frame000, frame001, frame002, etc, you could then import them to A:M as an animation sequence and export as a movie.

[Masna]

If you create a sequence of targa images and name them with sequential names, such as frame000, frame001, frame002, etc, you could then import them to A:M as an animation sequence and export as a movie.

 

 

 

What are targa images?

[Fuchur]

If you create a sequence of targa images and name them with sequential names, such as frame000, frame001, frame002, etc, you could then import them to A:M as an animation sequence and export as a movie.

 

 

 

What are targa images?

 

TARGA (or *.tga) is a fileformat which allows alphachannels and 8 bit per channel...

For example XnView can handle and convert this fileformat.

And of course, A:M can. It is the prevered fileformat for A:M because it is loseless and has transparency through the alpha-channel.

 

*Fuchur*

[Rodney]

I wanted to know if you could hand draw an animation then use animation master to play them like a flip book.

 

Others have already answered the basic question and I wholeheartedly agree.

Here are some things you'll want to watch out for though.

 

If you just want to use A:M as a line tester so you can view your drawn animation it'll work great.

For more complicated uses you get more complex answers.

 

When using any sequential images (.TGA, .JPG etc.) you'll want to use the same size image or run the risk of terminating the sequence prematurely. This can be problematic if you draw and then scan your images into your computer quickly without consideration for the variations that might be introduced to an image, its alignment, line quality etc. If you draw on a graphics tablet via your computer it may be less of an issue if you start with the same size image but registration/alignment of the images will still be a consideration. There are many effective ways to adjust drawn images for use with A:M.

 

A:M is a great tool for compositing images but it works best with images that have been created with compositing in mind.

A drawn image on a piece of paper generally will have to be prepared in some way to gain the benefit of compositing.

Placing a drawn background or a photograph in back of a character is common but if that character drawn on paper hasn't been prepared correctly you'll just see the white paper behind the character and not the background.

 

A:M does not have a Chromakey feature. It does have a Key Color feature that works similarly at a one color level.

With Key Color A:M will drop out sections of your image with that color to let what lies behind it show through.

Generally, A:M doesn't need Chromakey as images created within A:M can easily and automatically be masked when created. For more information on this aspect investigate Alpha Channels.

 

With v15 A:M has gained some new and very useful Non Linear editing tools that will serve traditional animators and CG artists well.

Once you have your animated sequence of images in A:M you can retime your animation, add titles and credits, create transitions and special effects... the list goes on and on.

 

All this to say... with the proper planning and understanding of the tools available A:M is a great program for hand drawn animation.