When editing an existing character (Lenny)

[baphomet]

I have a quick short question, but I am stuck with this problem for like 2 hours now and I would love to solve it. I am trying to edit and adjust the regular Lenny character that came with Anime Studio Pro 9.5

Please keep in mind I just started using AS since a couple of weeks because it offers much more options for 3 Dimensional environments then Toon Boom Harmony does to me personally, so that is why I switched to AS recently.

When trying to draw a beard and some other stuff in to his head in the head layer, it all looks good and just how I want it to look. Until I start playing around with the bones and start moving the head. Everything moves but not the stuff I just added. And I checked it to make sure I drew the stuff in the right layer, which I did. So what is it that I need to do in order to get the rest of the stuff (beard etc) moving with the rest of the head?

Any help would be very much appreciated.

[sbtamu]

Look in the manual for point binding. It is in the help section.

By the way I reworked Lenny a few days ago using smart bones. It is not perfect but is better than the one that comes with the software.

Look at this thread and you will see a link to the file in one of my post.

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=25492

[baphomet]

Thanks for the reply, I already kinda looked into the point binding thing, but couldn't manage to get it to work like I wan't it to be working. Nevertheless it could also be just me looking over stuff and noticing the right way to do it. Remember I came from the world of Toon Boom en TVPaint who both are totally different from AS. One thing AS should really fix is the pencil function. Drawing should feel the same as in Illustrator or Toon Boom, that would really ad even more to this already fantastic piece of software.

Especially when drawing with a tablet like I do, in that case it really would feel much more natural to draw when it would somehow be like drawing in Toon Boom and / or Illustrator. But then again on the other hand, it's maybe just me, not seeing what I should be seeing when overlooking things in AS. I am just a n00b in AS cause I recently switched and I am hardly near any level of experience.

[heyvern]

I would look at the tutorials and help files to learn how to bind points and layers. Once you get the hang of it it makes sense and is fairly simple.

As for the drawing tools, well... this has been an ongoing discussion for years, ever since the program was created. Some people want drawing tools and point curves "just like other applications". I have never really been a fan of that idea because it is the "odd" and uniquely different behavior of the curves in Anime Studio that make it so easy to animate with and, for me at least, better than those "other" apps.

If the drawing tools were just like toonboom or flash, then Anime Studio wouldn't be any different. Any benefits of it would be lost. You would end up with the same problems those other programs have due to the difficult to control shapes. The beauty of Anime Studio is the minimum number of points needed to create shapes. Fewer points, easier to animate. It is the way that the points smoothly change curvature during motion that makes it work so well. Bezier curve control in Anime Studio would exponentially increase the amount of point animation and control required. Each point would have 4 channels instead of 2, curve handle length, curve handle angle for each side of the point. As it is now, the curvature length and angle is based on proximity to the other points which makes smooth motion easier with fewer points and key frames. You don't have to animate curve angle only a single curvature channel for each point.

It's like saying "My bicycle should have 4 wheels and a motor like a car. I would be able to go further, get there faster and wouldn't fall down so much." If a bicycle had 4 wheels and a motor it wouldn't be a bicycle.

I too found the curves and point behavior in Anime Studio "strange" when first learning it. I eventually learned why that behavior was a benefit and not a problem. I learned how to work around the differences and take advantage of them.

[Danimal]

I too found the curves and point behavior in Anime Studio "strange" when first learning it. I eventually learned why that behavior was a benefit and not a problem. I learned how to work around the differences and take advantage of them.

Ditto to this. And I broke into a cold sweat just reading the workd "Bezier." Please, let us NEVER see those in Anime Studio. EVER.

[baphomet]

Thanks for all the feedback, and I will stick to Anime Studio, so probably it is the best for me to just hang in there and try to get a hang of it and the way the vectors work in Anime Studio. I think I just worked to long with the vectors like they are in Illustrator. I mean after all I am already working with Illustrator ever since the early 90's.

[ddrake]

And I broke into a cold sweat just reading the word "Bezier." Please, let us NEVER see those in Anime Studio. EVER.

Haha. Yeah, I don't know why, but pen tools and bezier control points never seemed intuitive to me.
The same principles here: See a point, select a point, move a point. Adjust curvature....

But then someone (in a tutorial for head turns I think) mentioned thinking about Anime Studio more like a sculpting tool rather than a drawing tool. Which obviously makes sense for head turns and simulating 3 dimensional rotation. But overall I think is a pretty good way to look at things in many aspects of the software.

Other times when a character is all rigged up and I'm just making my little adjustments, I'd liken the experience more to sitting on the floor and playing with dolls and puppets...

(But that's perfectly acceptable for a grown man in this context, right?)

[baphomet]

I spent some time drawing purely in Anime Studio Pro and after 60-90 minutes I started getting a hang of how it works. And I must say to be very honest, I can also see where this drawing technique is going! I mean to say that I see what it is mend for and what the possibilities are of drawing with this technique in this specific way. Look at a screenshot of what I managed to create in about 15 minutes after my 60-90 minutes of practicing earlier today.



Thanks again for all the feedback and good information!

[baphomet]

And again some more progress:

[jahnocli]

two observations:

1. This guy's arm seems lumpy in all the wrong places. Is it meant to look like that?
2. There's a stylistic clash between the background and the character. Sometimes that works, but I don't think this is one of those times...

[baphomet]

Thanks for the feedback. Please keep in mind that I just started working with Anime Studio Pro and that I am still getting adjusted to the way it works. I allready pointed that out above here, but nevertheless hereby especially for you I just did it again.

Anyways, I am still teaching myself and by that learning this for me relatively new software. This was just some kind of exercise I am working on, to make sure I can create everything like I want it to be. Because I really want this cartoon to have a specific feeling and my personal touch to it. It will be a combination of different styles, but there all my styles so these mixed styles will basically form and create a new style that will be characterizing this cartoon. It will really have is own special feeling, and I think it should be unique.

But again, thanks for the feedback, and I will really keep in mind what you just pointed out, but I already kinda made that discovery about the character not matching with the background myself as well. Also I know the arms and hands are far from how the will look eventually, but it is just trying stuff out, trying to create my own "workflow" in this beautiful piece of software that really somehow is starting to become a dangerous addiction to me.

Below another screenshot of some playing around and testing, tweaking and learning stuff in ASP.