Threshold + New particle source

[Víctor Paredes]

I needed to animate a face made by clouds for a short I'm working on. Yesterday I realized the new threshold feature, plus the new "Use base layer as particle source" would work perfectly for what I wanted.
I also used some masking to create the shading.
It's awesome how open this software is, there are so many tools to combine and experiment with.


Sadly I can't share the file and don't have time right now to make a tutorial, but I hope you like the result

[Little Yamori]

What a great look, really smooth and magical, can't wait to incorporate things like this into my work.

Thanks for sharing the inspiration

[neeters_guy]

Man, that blows my mind. Amaaaazing.

[ddrake]

Looks great! Have been wondering how long I can hold off without updating to 10, but these new particle options and the threshold stuff could make some stuff I have planned SO much easier it's looking like. Although, your results can often make anything "look" easy.

And here I just put the time into "z-depth-ing" a whole bunch of layers for character's head turns because I'm only at 9.2

But, hate to be so behind the curve if everyone's going to be playing with and talking about the new features of 10 on the forum.

[jahnocli]

Beautiful illustration of some of the new possibilities with version 10. Thanks for sharing.

[Danimal]

That really looks quite incredible!

[AmigaMan]

Wow! That does look amazing. So many new things to experiment with

[hammerjammer]

I spent two hours last night trying to recreate that cloud face thing. I was trying to make a skull version of this.
Maybe I'll just stick to easy stuff like squares and tri-angles. No headaches or tricks to worry about. No particles and No masking (OH HOW I HATE MASKING & PARTICLES), Sorry lost my cool & sanity there for a second.

anyway

UM , I don't even know what to say without getting a headache again.

Maybe I will just wait till Anime Studio version 25 or whatever comes out with a USB cable to plug into my head and download some of Selgins super powers.

I know, I'm a dreamer.

HammerJammer

[CartoonM!ke]

Here's a quickie I did using the new particle source option:



No masks, just 4 shapes on one layer (the source layer -- the bottommost layer in a particle group) that moves together to form a skull (just 4U HammerJammer!). Set the velocity and spread to zero and that's all. Rendered and violá! I didn't over think it, so I didn't even got to the point of creating a mask layer. It took me longer to draw the skull pieces than to work out the particle settings.

I'm positive that Selgin has a much more elegant way of doing it. But until he does do a tutorial, it's possible for a inexperienced user like me to whip up something passable.

[hammerjammer]

Hello CartoonM!ke

I didn't over think it

Firstly thanks for the response. Looks good. I like it.

I have moved on. I'm over it I think.....I didn't really think I was over thinking it, till much later.
I had a five piece skull to start with. I see you had 4. I even over time animated my base shapes into blobs and odd shaped clouds so that you could not tell what the pieces were till they all came together to form the skull. But, it took me forever to figure out the particles, I did have them coming from the bases of the 5 pieces of my skull. But they were going all over the place like all the pieces were exploding. So, with it doing that you couldn't tell what the pieces were forming into. I finally figured that part out then moved onto forming the eyes, nose and teeth. I was trying to use masking for the eyes, nose and teeth because I was sure that's what Selgin did. I watched Selgins little GIF of it like 20 times, Selgin did say that he used masking in his, so I was just trying to follow the Master (As I take a bow ). I think he used masking on the pupils of the eyes and part of the nose. So when I tried to use masking to do this, No matter what I did I could not get the back round to show through to form my eyes nose and teeth.( I think I was just using masking incorrectly and just got frustrated even more when I looked at Selgins Post again and noticed that he said he also used the threshold feature. What the hell is threshold? At that point I had enough. THATS WHEN I though I was OVER THINKING IT... And I now didn't feel like trying to understand threshold also, so I gave up and deleted all that I had done up to that point and went to watch some Bugs Bunny cartoons on dvd.

So after all that, you know the skull clouds and watching Bugs Bunny dvds. I went back to playing with something that I did understand, Target Bones.

Thanks CartoonM!ke, By the way, your skull does look good. My only question would be, How did you form the eyes and stuff after the pieces come together?

HammerJammer

[CartoonM!ke]

Kinda sneaky is how I did the eye and nose holes… First I drew a skull. Then, in display properties, I checked the box to grey out the inactive layers so I could trace the original drawing easier. Created a new layer and then drew the pieces of the skull, making sure I had some overlap. I wasn't worried about it "looking purdy" as this was just a proof of concept kinda thing.

The next 2 images show the process:


This is what I drew, tracing the original drawing. Went to frame 240 and key framed it.
Then I went back to frame zero and moved the pieces around:



The keyframe held and the pieces moved exactly into place.

Just like a mystery writer, I started with the solution and then made the puzzle.

I made a particle layer, making the particles really, really tiny.Moved the skull pieces layer into the Particle group so it was the bottom layer, checked the Use Base Layer checkbox. Tweaked the particle settings as I mentioned earlier.

Thanks, I was very pleasantly surprised at how it turned out.

Hope this helps. And Bugs is truly the tonic for frustration relief!

[heyvern]

... I also used some masking to create the shading.

For something like this you can't use shape shading because it's made of many particles. The shape layer emitting the particles can't have shading because the shape isn't part of the rendering, it's just used as a particle emitter. If you put shading on the entire particle layer, it can't be specific to the shapes... the whole layer is part of the same shading so the individual cloud shapes wouldn't have individual shading.

The shading had to be done on another layer and masked somehow, so each part of the face can have it's own specific shading. That is what the masking was used for... er... I am of course guessing. I don't know exactly how it was done but it seems the most likely way.

The face itself didn't require any masking.

[Little Yamori]

Just a quick observation on the shading thing. In Selgin's example it looks possibly as simple as an over layer with the opacity turned down and the blur turned up in a sort of purplish color that create the shading effect. ( I still am in anime kindergarten with masking, so maybe I'm just always looking for work arounds).

[hammerjammer]

Thanks Heyvern

The shape layer emitting the particles can't have shading because the shape isn't part of the rendering, it's just used as a particle emitter.

Thank you, That sort of makes sense to me now. As fas as the shading goes, I'm not sure I understand. Thats ok though, I will figure it out.

HammerJammer

[hammerjammer]

.
Hello CartoonM!ke

Kinda sneaky is how I did the eye and nose holes…

I See, the eye and stuff were already part of the shapes. That just goes back to the old saying, Keep it simple. I totally didn't think of that. I overlooked the obvious. After I already had asked you in my post how you did it, much later while laying in bed and thinking, only then did I think of that.

There are probably a bunch of ways to do it. Some more complicated than others but your simple is better approach does the job just fine.
Thanks for your help CartoonM!ke.

Back to the drawing board

By the way, Bugs is still the king. its a shame its not on tv anymore or very little. I would never try and do that type of animation though. I can't draw anything very well. I tend to get stuff from the internet and then trace, rig and animate them. I think I'm getting pretty good at the rigging. There not as fancy and complicated as Selgins and many others on here, But every day I try something new. Some days they don't go very well But, i'm sure of one thing YOU ALL have been there too. My animation on the other hand needs help, my characters tend to be a little more robotic than I'd like. But, practice makes perfect.

Ok, I'm done rambling on.

Thanks for your help.

HammerJammer