Animation Software
Village Idiot
Member, PRO Posts: 486
I found this: http://esotericsoftware.com
Does anybody know about it? Is it something you'd use with GS? Or is there something else I should try? Or should I just stick to what GS has built in? I'm curious about this now as I noticed the nice animation going on in Kirafus' Roll Turtle. I also noticed his all around amazingness.
Comments
anyone?
No-one has an opinion on this?
Download the trial maybe?
I use Spriter http://www.brashmonkey.com/spriter.htm
Yes, it's animation software that you can intigrate with certain SDKs, there was talk a long time back from @Codewizard about possible integration with GameSalad.
You could if you wanted to, although you render out each frame rather than use the SDK-runtime stuff.
There are many many animation applications you could use, too many and varied to list, there are numerous 3D apps, motion graphics apps like Motion or After Effects, stop-frame apps, 2D animation apps like Flash . . . etc etc
Thanks for the answers @Socks I appreciate it. It looks amazing – though it sounds like it'd be clunky and tedious if you'd have to render out each frame.
Since Gamesalad currently supports only frame based animation you'll have to render out each frame no matter what animation software you choose to use.
http://jamie-cross.net/posts/ ✮ Udemy: Introduction to Mobile Games Development ✮ Learn Mobile Game Development in One Day Using Gamesalad ✮ My Patreon Page
Yep, agreed, it'd be no more clunky or tedious than any other animation software . . . and it's worth noting that GameSalad's handling of image sequences is pretty impressive, it's perfectly happy dealing with long and high frame rate image sequences (GameSalad can do in real time what I could only dream of in After Effects) so there's no reason the process should be clunky, in fact I suspect the process would be less involved than using an integrated driver for Spline within GS, for example for a run cycle it would involve little more than rendering off the sequence (run001 run002 run003 etc) and then constraining the actor's image to "run"..floor(self.time*fps).
Of course it'd be great to see something like Spline integrated into GameSalad, as you could do so much more with it than you can with image sequences, but pre-rendered image sequences (that require no IK / FK calculations or rasterisation etc) are still a great option and there's a reason why they are often used in major commercial software, and I suspect that's precisely because of the stripped down (non clunky) workflow of having each frame as a sepetate image that requires no code or third party software (or rasterisation or calculation) to play.
@Socks, there is a lot to be said for 'simple' frame based animation. I've dealt with creating individual frames for many many years so I'm perfectly comfortable with it and find it very easy to work with.
@monkeyboy simian, if you're new to creating frame based animations, start small, take your time and you should get the hang if it in no time.
http://jamie-cross.net/posts/ ✮ Udemy: Introduction to Mobile Games Development ✮ Learn Mobile Game Development in One Day Using Gamesalad ✮ My Patreon Page
Ive played with spine. Really depends on what animations you want to do. It's a skill in itself. I hire illustrators to do my animations or buy them off the shelf.
Will learn animation software someday.
I have both application, but I found more tutorials and updates on Spine if this helps.
Thanks for the feedback @everyone – I think it sounds like just sticking with what GS has will do for now. I asked Kirafu what he uses and he said Flash. I'm wondering whether there's any advantage in using it?
@monkeyboy simian, if you happen to already know how to use Flash I'd say it's a good option. If you are learning something new from scratch I wouldn't waste my time. Flashes days are numbered and in my opinion you'd be better served in the long run learning something that will be around longer.
http://jamie-cross.net/posts/ ✮ Udemy: Introduction to Mobile Games Development ✮ Learn Mobile Game Development in One Day Using Gamesalad ✮ My Patreon Page
You can use any software that outputs a .Png file I use Pixen, Photoshop, and Blender for my games.
@jamie_c Flash is on the way out?
It doesn't have to be PNG files, GameSalad will accept a whole range of formats . . JPEGs, PNGs, GIFs, PSD, TIFFs (etc) . . . and even if the software doesn't output something that GameSalad can read (for example TGA files) then all you have to do is convert them to a format it can read . . . so I wouldn't limit your choices to software that can only output a certain format.
@monkeyboy simian, in my opinion yes. Since Flash files do not play on mobile devices for the most part it's use has dropped dramatically. I'm sure it's still used plenty by people who already know how to use it well. But if I were going to take the time and energy to learn a new piece of software for animation I wouldn't choose Flash at this point.
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/12/adobe-to-kill-off-flash-in-januarys-creative-cloud-update/
http://jamie-cross.net/posts/ ✮ Udemy: Introduction to Mobile Games Development ✮ Learn Mobile Game Development in One Day Using Gamesalad ✮ My Patreon Page
I think you are conflating Flash for creating embedded / web animation files (which as you correctly say is on the way out - and has been for years) and Flash as an animation tool, Flash as an animation tool is not effected by the slow demise of its status as a web animation tool - and would have no effect on its use as an animation tool to be used with GameSalad - in fact Flash as an animation tool goes from strength to strength.
The animation tool Flash (rather than the Flash browser plug in for creating embedded / web animation files) is not being killed off, it's just getting name change.
Or to put it in simple terms . . . there's this animation tool called Flash, which creates animations . . . one of its output formats is SWF, this was once the defacto web animation choice, every banner ad and animation web page used Flash once upon a time, this has now been superseded by things like HTML5 . . . so now people using the animation tool called Flash render out their files as HTML5 instead of SWF . . . but if you are not creating animations to be embedded in web browsers then none of this matters as you'll just be outputting PNGs or TGAs (or whatever).
Yeah, I guess you are correct @Socks. My main use of Flash in the past has been for creating web ads for my graphic design business. So that has no doubt seemed like its main purpose to me. But it is a multipurpose tool. I guess I'd just want to be sure it (or any tool) was going to still be around if I were going to invest time in learning it from scratch.
http://jamie-cross.net/posts/ ✮ Udemy: Introduction to Mobile Games Development ✮ Learn Mobile Game Development in One Day Using Gamesalad ✮ My Patreon Page
Yeah, it's had an odd history, it started life exactly as you describe, for creating web ads and embedded animations, that was its main purpose, in fact I think in the beginning it was its only purpose, then over time, animators (who had nothing to do with web based stuff) started to use it purely for animation - in fact I know a few animators who use Flash (the last job I worked on was all Flash) they're all traditional animators, and wouldn't even know what we were talking about if they were dragged into this conversation, to them the fact that it can output SWF files is just some other output option in the Export menu that they haven't got a clue what it's for.
These are people who - in the animation industry - would actually describe themselves as first and foremost a Flash animator. Flash has been used like this (divorced from its original web ads history) for at least 15 years.
Like I say, Flash has just gone from strength to strength (the latest update has some great new stuff), if I wanted to learn an animation tool I'd say Flash was a good choice, not only is it constantly upgraded, but it's from Adobe, about a solid company as you could hope for, and even when they decided to jettison the Flash web player (remember from the point of view of the animation software this is simply one output option of many) they still said they'd support it for at least 10 years. I doubt most companies can guarantee their actual software will be around in 10 years, let alone one of it's uses/formats.
The one thing with Flash is that is it still predominately a vector based set-up, so if you are into that style it's still the place to go, but if that's not your thing then I'd look elsewhere.
I learned something new today, I always thought it was just .PNGs.
Flash is pro animation software. 20$ /month might be more than you need.
http://tumult.com/hype/ might be worth a look - far cheaper and more accessable than Flash ( and obviously covering vastly different market sectors ) but with physics and export to png sequence and a modern interface anyone with even the vaguest notion of timeline/keyframe animation you will be producing usable output in minutes !!
oh... and it doesn't poop all over your Mac in the way only Adobe apps do 
@tmann That looks interesting – and affordable! So if it exports to PNG that would make it GS friendly, right?
Free trial. Make sure there are lots of tutorials and support. Those are just as valuable as product. Didn't see export options. But if PNG it should be GS happy.
As @socks said, Flash is still very much used in the animation industry. It's a perfectly good piece of software to use, you're just never going to use it to program anything. It's a pretty user friendly piece of software for animation and many companies, even the one I work at (a large animation studio) have a department that uses primarily flash. Many Korean studios, where television animation is usually made, also use flash, TV Paint, or Toonboom studio/Toonboom Harmony. That's after they've already drawn on pencil and paper however, they're not completely digital and usually start that way first. Personally, I often use a mixture of flash, photoshop, and after effects when animating.
All of this doesn't really matter as long as you can export some image files. As far as what program you want to learn, that's up to you. The place where I can give advice is just art stuff:
What you really need is to have good design choices and to work in an environment you feel comfortable with. Roll Turtle has good design choices. People will accept the most limited animation in the world if the designs are top quality. Look at anime for example. Anime comes from a long history of extremely limited animation, but it took off as a genre because of some shows with strong storytelling and strong design. Early anime was literally a still image with a flapping mouth. Sometimes they wouldn't even do that, they'd simply turn the character that was speaking away from the camera so you couldn't see their mouth.
For example, Pokemon is not a well animated show, but the designs are iconic and well thought out and that helps it become extremely successful. Angry Birds is not well animated, but it also has some iconic design choices (some cute sound effects certainly help). A little polish on the visual appeal goes a long way.
So while you're getting into this stuff, I would also start reading a bit on character design. It can only help your final product!
Vote for Nearest Neighbor Scaling option in gamesalad! Let's make our games look truly stunning!
Thanks @owen_dennis – I appreciate the advice. This place seems to attract some real pros.. bonus for people like me!
maybe worth a read http://www.wired.com/2015/12/adobe-flash-is-dead-in-name-only/
Same deal as other comments here, this is all about Flash as a web content platform and has nothing to do with Flash as an animation tool, in this regard the article, and all the concerns about Flash being outmoded, insecure and having a questionable future, is entirely irrelevant as they are referring to Flash as a web content platform - for example is any one here, with regard to making animations for GameSalad, seriously concerned that they'll make an animated spinning coin or rolling turtle and it'll be 'insecure' (insecure from what!?!?)
er.. yeah ..just said it might be worth a read...the reference to the upcoming Animate CC I thought might be of interest. Anyway I would have thought that Flash was a very poor choice for someone new to animation as the sh!t storm of an interface is cluttered up with all the non animation Flash garbage.