cutting images from sprite sheets

Gnarly

I have a lot of animations that are delivered in sprite sheets. The problem I have is isolating the images so when played in GS they look correct. I understand that they have to be the same size. I guess this is more of an illustration question but I thought there might be some experience here.

Ive tried many times and I always have to do it several times unit its "good enough" but never perfect....

I could be just useless at illustration. I use idraw.

Thanks

Hopscotch

@gattoman, idraw(now graphic) is a great tool. However it lacks easy cropping and slice tools.

To get around it, I would suggest cutting each frame and placing it on a separate layer.

Now you can position the animation frames on top of each other, such, that they are positioned correctly in relation to each other and as the animation should look.

Next, reduce the canvas size, in such a way that the center of gravity of your animation is somewhere in the middle and no parts of any of the frames are cut off.

Then, export each layer separately, of course keeping the same for each.

Gnarly

That's brilliant. Let me try that in idraw. Your right the last date changed it to graphic.
Let me see if I can actually do it.

Thanks!!!!!! Has been bugging me for ages.....

Gnarly

@Hopscotch said:
gattoman, idraw(now graphic) is a great tool. However it lacks easy cropping and slice tools.

To get around it, I would suggest cutting each frame and placing it on a separate layer.

Is there any way to crop images automatically or I will have to manually cut out each image?

Not a biggie just if you know idraw (graphic)

Thanks

Franto

Photoshop has the ability to auto-crop images with transparencies. For example, if I have a .psd with 100 frames with an image and transparency, and I go to Files>Scripts>Export Layers to Files, and select PNG as the file for destination, you'll have the option to "trim layrs", which gets rid of the excess transparency outside the edge the graphic image within the original file. There are many other ways that Photoshop can autocrop. You can get a 30 day free trial of the current, Photoshop CC, from adobe.com if you don't have it.

Hopscotch

@gattoman , I don't think so. This is it's drawback for our purposes. Other than that it is well rounded in it functionality, especially at its low price.

Gnarly

Thanks

rvantilborg

@gattoman @Hopscotch for real good animations check this out:http://www.brashmonkey.com its easy to create them yourself. the program is free (partially) and takes about an hour to learn to make your good first animation (atleast i succeeded within an hour:)

Gnarly

@rvantilborg said:
gattoman Hopscotch for real good animations check this out:http://www.brashmonkey.com its easy to create them yourself. the program is free (partially) and takes about an hour to learn to make your good first animation (atleast i succeeded within an hour:)

I've heard of it. Will look into it. Cool. Thanks

Gnarly

Your method worked perfectly. Looks amazing. Thanks so much. You saved me hours of work and grief!!!!

rvantilborg

@gattoman enjoy it, i came across it this week myself and i created a bunch of nice stuff already… the method of assigning bones to limbs is really easy and you can export it to animated gif immediately, even with the free version. no watermarks etc… maybe i'll buy the full version in the future.
just give it an hour or 2 and you'r done learning the basics.

rvantilborg

@gattoman btw i had the same problem with animation sizes:P real annoying...

Hopscotch

@rvantilborg yep,

Spriter is like Anime Studio, great in posing and creating tweened skeletal animations.

Anime Studio is also great on the creative side, easy to create vector art cartoon style drawings, smart onion skin layers for frame drawing, etc. Almost a substitute for Illustrator. But, fiddly in exporting cropped animation frames.

Spriter better in the export of animations, but lacking in the creation part.

rvantilborg

Btw i used this tutorial to get started as well as the tutorial written in the help section of the spriter software.

rvantilborg

@Hopscotch i will check 'anime studio' soon. Im really busy on updating my
New release. Since im still a noob this is the first
Time i actually updated an app today (or atleast uploaded
It to itunesconnect
Today)

Thunder_Child

I need illustrator so bad. Seems to be THE software of choice.

Gnarly

@Thunder_Child said:
I need illustrator so bad. Seems to be THE software of choice.

I could not justify the cost for adobe illustrator. Idraw now Called graphic does 90% of what I need. Only 25$

Bloom looks interesting. Might give it a try at some point. I wish it had a free trial to play with for a few hours..........

SLOCM3Z

GIMP is good for cutting stuff and re-sizing it all. And it is free

shumicpi

Wow I was not aware of iDraw before. But now its looking interesting. Let me try soon