Doc:Animation Basics

prestito cagliari hyper threading agenzia matrimoniali umbria pamela anderson and tommy lee www francesco renga it hoy snap lock seni misura pesante sen si 281 spe 322 ni non aprite un ritratto di fa blowjob teen mivar 16 tornato catalogo telefonico ragazzo pantelleria emma dumas tutti cellulari profazio olivetti logos 662 memorie olimpus hanoi ristorante lh w250sc gazzano screen saver downloads trucchi yeti sesso graties aventura love and hate samsung ws-32z316v shiseido tanning tettone lola ferrari canon bp-2l12 www chiamami coppa uefa concessionario audi spirit duo mp3 1gb the birds nd the bees windows xp service pack2 p4 ht computer foxtrott acer - al1912s video alessia marcuzzi morti viventi in alta definizione fatturati fiat grosseto incontri passionali a.l.i.a.s la casa di bernarda alba libri custodia n50 uomini e no grizzly peluche red ronni maggioni libri video or lo zingaro felice bmw r 1100 s minaccia da un miliardo di dollari fa che non copertoni mtb www jeuxvideos com victory is won santana www one love it packard bell 6417 x800pro 256mb hp palmari fotocamera motivi abbigliamento lumix dmc fx7 silver panasonic vendita gomma auto italiani bonolis top model nuova audi a3 sportback diesel auto dsg frigorifero mta 241 winnebago foto personaggi libro della giungla palanzano speed devils online racing delonghi pac fx 400 clarke, arthur charles il sale sulla pelle knight, george wilson jordan capry horkyze irrigazione giardini lampadari tagliarisme a ghigliottina dahle 846 ciberpostales nokia videocamera video modella inkjet 2800dtn sennheiser hd-595 indiano i ribelli dei sette mari topless spiaggia colle brianza pane princess donne e autoreggenti www sfondi foto it luce led usb pretty young thing cooler sempron socket a lavastoviglie rex incasso totale i due capitani processore athlon 64 magdalen santobono actua tennis fujitsu siemens notebook amilo m1437g le guin i migliori venti vasco rossio e gia ieri mastrota olympus rm-cb1 video tg5 d50 body only peridotite incontri reggio calabria sexo rusas cartolina elettroniche compleanno drivers scheda video winfast isolanti acustici milano e provincia kv 28 rete gigabit paese basso cose fare traduzione testo f k it lettore portatile mp3 con radio highlander ii - il ritorno alberghi selvino nadia rinaldi volo ecuador mi manchi a morire coppie bisex ttr 900 giocattoli a batteria tata young i believe monica bel matrix sedere jennifer lopez roma napoli blinblin cerca oro clistere pissing il senso del divino love hira pubblicita tribe anna falchi dellamorte passat tdi http expressions heinle com giro d italia 2006 church, richard william panasonic nv-gs21 e camera siviglia helsinki alberghi e hotel tracer 7600 laser co2 in oftalmologia motorola v220 black down, north- bambolina remix laserjet hp 1300 batteria per qtek laso his tabella di pallavolo gameboy nintendo mp3 r kelly i banditi del petrolio coppie catania tiziano ferro rojo relativo www video post it www casertanews it san bernardo, gran prime foto e un sito per jade empire por ella rastrelliera biciclette la marcia del bersagliere ragazzo segrate v3 razr nero webcam donne italiane porche dr dre guilty conscience n90 freycinet, louis claude de sa... eurosk elenco telefonico di pargi jedi sport teneramente in tre cassa edile di perugia pietre preziose my band d 12 feat eminem confessiones verona madrid biglietti aerei catrina suite li pensiero di giuseppe ungaretti elise 111 s dela candela stacey dash farting witec playground canzoni di ovindoli sex brazil ww tf1 fr convertitori ogg mp3 dekster flash erotici adsl veloce jetix 3d soccer treno con parole (Draft) Note to the reader: Please be patient. It may take a few days to finish the initial draft.

Introduction

Creating an animation in Synfig is really easy: It basically means to change a drawing - you just need to create the first state and the last state of a change, and Synfig will take care of the steps in between.

Let's have a look at a simple example. Consider a moving light similar to the one in front of the KnightRider car. Drop the realism and you get a circle that is moving from the left to the right, and back. In other words, you need to create three 'steps' or 'stages':

1. The circle is on the left.
2. The circle is on the right.
3. The circle is back on the left.

Let's do it.

Setting up the workspace

Start Synfig Studio, and create a new file. A dialog called 'Properties' will appear. Give your new file a name and a description, and then click "Apply" (don't click "Save" yet -- we're not quite done with the 'Properties' dialog). Make sure to edit 'End Time'. The strange looking '0f' will change to a more familiar presentation as soon as you click it. Set this to 2 seconds.

Now create a simple black rectangle that will serve as our background. It's not necessary to make it cover the whole canvas.

We now need a circle. Change the painting color to red, and draw a circle. It doesn't matter if it's not perfect: You can edit it. Activate the 'Normal' tool, and click the circle. It will go into a sort of editing mode which is easy to detect by the small green dot in the middle and the white rectangle around it. You can move the red circle by grapping it on its green dot in the middle.

This are the first steps to draw an object and to move it, but not yet an animation, you may say. Indeed. Let's have a look how this works.

Adding movement

In the beginning, you entered a value of 2 seconds in the 'Properties' dialog. Due to this, your canvas window (the one where you draw) got additional capabilities. There's a grey time slider, for instance. You can click on it, and a small orange indicator will appear but nothing changes. This is because you need to switch to 'Animate Editing Mode' first by clicking the green dot just to the right of the grey time slider. You will note that your canvas gets a red outline; it reminds you that changes to your objects now affect your animation.

Previously, three 'steps' or 'stages' were mentioned. These are represented by so-called 'keyframes' (Just in case you're familiar with video encoding: No, that's not the same!). A keyframe is an image in time where something important happens with your objects.

Click the keyframe tab -- this is the one with the small key in the 'Params, etc.' window -- to be able to edit keyframes. Now click the small 'plus' sign and you should get a new entry in the list displaying '0f, 0f, (JMP)'.

If this didn't happen, you made something not mentioned so far. Close your file and start again.

If the entry appears, go to the '1s 0f' mark in the timeslider. The small orange indicator should move there. Then add another keyframe by clicking the small plus sign. Repeat the process with the time slider indicator set to '2s of'. You should have three keyframes in the list, now.

The s's and f's: Understanding the Timeline

By now, you may have figured out what those mysterious '1s 0f'-type marks represent. They indicate a specific point on the timeline, expressing a location in terms of seconds (s) and frames (f).

Each second is divided into 24 frames, much like a meter on a measuring tape is divided into 100 centimeters. The frame markings begin at zero (0) and go up to 24, whereupon a new second is entered and the framecount returns to zero.

For example: "three frames into the sixth second" of an animation using this timeline notation would be "5s 3f." Why "5s" instead of "6s"? Because we always begin counting from zero.

The Keyframe List

The keyframe list is rather easy to understand: It displays 'Time' which is basically the start time, 'Length' which is self-explanatory, 'Jump' which we'll cover next, and 'Description' which is, again, self-explanatory.

Now what the hell are the entries called '(JMP)'? In fact, these are links just like web links: Click them, and the indicator in your timeslider will jump to the correct time.

You can use this to edit your image for a given moment in time. For instance, you can now jump to the first second, and move the red circle to the right. There! You made your first movement; your first animation with Synfig!

You wonder where the animation is? Just click to arbitray position on the timeslider: You will note that the red circle is in positions where you didn't move it to! What happen? Snyfig figured out what you would like to do, namely move the circle, and draw all the images between these states. Each image will later make a frame in your animation; and the circle will appear to be moving.

Rendering your animation

Before you can see your animation, you need to process (or render) your work. There are two ways to do so; using the synfigstudio (what you have been using so far), or the command-line program synfig.

To do so, close the animate editing mode by clicking on the red dot in the timeline editing widget, and save your file; for instance under the name BasicKnightRider.sif. Then press on the > symbol in the upper left corner of the image window to open the menu, open the File menu and click on the Render item. Change the target filename to BasicKnightRider.gif in the same location you saved BasicKnightRider.sif and choose your render settings, then click Render. Depending on your processor speed it should take a few moments, but finally the image window status bar should say "File rendered successfully".

Open BasicKnightRider.gif in Firefox or another application that is able to show animated gif's. However, Firefox will replay the GIF all the time which makes your short animation a rather long one. If you're now seeing a red circle moving from the left to the right and back: Congratulations! You just made your first animation!

Note: you can also preview your animation. Press on the > symbol in the upper left corner of the image window to open the menu. There choose File->Preview.

If you would rather use the command line instead of the menu to render your animation, then open a terminal (On Windows, go Start -> Run -> type cmd<enter>), change to the directory you saved the file, and type something like

synfig -t gif BasicKnightRider.sif

WARNING: The version you are using may not support the GIF output format at the moment, it depends on the version and compilation settings.

A few messages appear that don't matter right now. Depending on your processor speed it should take a few moments, but finally a line like

BasicKnightRider.sif ==> BasicKnightRider.gif: DONE

should appear, then you are done and can view your animated gif using firefox or another program as mentioned above.

Conclusion

Of course, the position of an object is not the only thing you can change with Synfig Studio. Other possibilities incude its size, its outline, its color, etc. Synfig comes with several example files that should let you dig deeper into the possibilities.