Inital impression

Dustbunny · Post by **Dustbunny** » Wed Dec 13, 2006 1:13 am

Had AS now for about 4 days and already I got pretty much a good idea on how everything works. There is a lack of user friendliness such as no shortcut keys for each tool. Perhaps it's just that I'm not used to using the different keys compared to using Adobe or Macromedia progs.

I will use it to animate such things as:
A chain link rope in perspective dangle from a roof using bone-rigging.
Smoother bodily movements using bone-rigging.
3D moving backgrounds using the Z axis depth.

Things I wonder if it can be done with AS such as:
Glowing bright light source effect such as a background window that glows and also surrounds a glow around a moving character that overlaps in the foreground.
A 3D object such as a motorcycle that looks as clean as the red cube in the tutorial.

Touched · Post by **Touched** » Wed Dec 13, 2006 3:24 am

I've seen a glimpse of some scripts that assign keyboard shortcuts to things. I think it might be possible to edit the .lua files for the tools and give them your preferred keyboard shortcut, but I need confirmation for this. Experienced users, is this possible?

For the glow you want, try using the Layer Shadow, with a bright colour, and adjust the offset to 0 for a window, and offset to the side for a character lit from the side.

artfx · Post by **artfx** » Wed Dec 13, 2006 4:11 am

You can do a soft stroke or soft edge on objects to create a nice glow effect, but having a glow surround a moving character will require some matte work or masking layers and I don't think it will redraw the soft edge to match each new cut of the shape.

Has anyone tried this?

Rai López · Post by **Rai López** » Wed Dec 13, 2006 4:14 am

HI (...eEeeEy! Touched

), you can change the Tools shortcuts editing (make first a backup just in case...) the _tool_list.txt file that you'll find inside "C:\Program files\e frontier\Anime Studio Pro\scripts\tool" folder, take an eye into it and you'll see how much easy it can be

...Ah! And even you can change your Menu comand shortcuts too, well, although it's not so easy, you can do it if you really want, see

here and/or search for other related threads, BYE!

myles · Post by **myles** » Wed Dec 13, 2006 4:27 am

You could possibly use layer shadows (with expansion but no offset) to create a glow around a character - just choose a glow colour instead of a shadow colour - see Tutorial 6.6.

To mask the glow so it only occurs near the window, you could possibly use some variation of Lost Marble's shadow trick in Tutorial 6.5, only without the shearing - create a blurred shadow/glow duplicate, which you could then mask (possibly with a blurred mask).

Regards, Myles.