Moho Forum

I was wondering if it is at all possible to select an already drawn vector and find out which properties had been applied to it.

For example, I drew a wing and added an alpha and a blur to it for my character while facing straight ahead and then I wanted to add the same properties to wings I made for the same character's back view but I don't remember (and didn't write it down) what alpha and effect I used and now my wings look wildly different.

I tried using the png of the wings I wanted in the swatches area but it does not show the alpha or the effect that was used.
I was going to copy and past the wing but it is rotated so when I try using it for the back view it deforms when I animate it! Any ideas?

Well I feel silly! Not two minutes after I posted this that I found the answer myself, duh!
I use the select shape in the fill tools and poof there's all the information I need in the style panel.

giselle wrote:Well I feel silly! Not two minutes after I posted this that I found the answer myself, duh!
I use the select shape in the fill tools and poof there's all the information I need in the style panel.

This happens to me constantly. I try like crazy not to post my question until I just can't stand it anymore. I hit the wall and have no solutions...

... then minutes after posting I find the solution. I think there is some kind of force in the universe tha "reads" these posts and sends the answers directly to the brain.

----

You should use styles! For the wings as an example, just click the "copy" button with the wing shape selected, then under the "Styles" drop down menu in the styles palette select new and click the "paste" button. Give your style a useful name like... er... "wings". Now you can apply that style and never have to know anything about it and you can change it easily later.

-vern

lol, my thoughts exactly!

I ran into some more trouble though! Maybe posting it will answer it like the last time.

I did what you said with the styles but I still don't seem to be able to apply it to the other wings. Thank you so much for helping, and now that I know about the styles it will really help things along (when I figure out how to apply the changes of course) AS is really quite powerful when you know about all it's tools! Very cool indeed!

There are a few things that might cause trouble applying a style.

There are checkboxes for fill color, line color and line width on a shapes fill and line style and also for a saved style. Depending on which ones are checked on the style or the shapes "default" styles will determine which ones show up in the shape.

(IMPORTANT NOTE! The checkbox for "Enable fil" and "Enable stroke" on a shape turn off fills and strokes completely... so don't get them mixed up with the "Fill color" or other checkboxes. On named styles you will see those boxes are grayed out.)

For instance if you have a filled and stroked shape and then apply a style and the shapes check boxes are checked those attributes will override the applied styles settings. If the check boxes are UNCHECKED on the saved style then they don't get used at all (except for effects. You can uncheck the fill color on a named style but any effects applied to that style will show on a shape***.)

Here is the thing I always mess up and is what I think is happening with you. When you copy styles from a shape and paste to a new style ALL THE CHECK BOXES ARE OFF! How annoying. This is because a shapes boxes are grayed out since there is no style applied so when you copy and paste you paste the "unchecked-ness" of those boxes. I honestly believer it should be the other way around when pasting styles but.. whatever.

From the styles palette select the saved style and check all the boxes for fill, line etc. then make sure the boxes are UNCHECKED when you SELECT the actual shape. Make sure the shape is selected or you might be just unchecking the boxes for the last style you selected in the palette.

This is a powerful tool! By unchecking or checking those boxes you can mix and match multiple styles in all kinds of ways.

For instance I like to create a default stroke style. It has a set color and weight but the fill is unchecked. You can apply two styles to a shape so I apply my fill style first (with strokes unchecked in the style properies) and apply the "default stroke" style as the second style. Remember that the SECOND applied style will override the first one. If you have a fill color set on both only the second one will show in the shape.

You can also uncheck the line width in a style but keep the color, or you can uncheck the color and just keep the width. This allows for mixing say a specific color stroke style with one just for the line width.

There a lots of options.

*** This kicks arse! You can apply more than just two effects to a shape using this method. You could apply... uh... up to 6 different effects to one shape. Just uncheck the "fill color" on the "effects styles". You can apply two effects to the base shape, apply two more styles each with two effects... total effects = 6.

-vern

I see how versatile this can and should be but I guess I need to be walked through the actual steps to applying it to my other wing because I can't get it to work still.

This is what I have done so far: I have copied the first wing's properties in the styles panel and it shows up as wing with all the correct properties.

now what do I do? I tried the select all on the other wing's layer and then using the create shape to select it, I then selected the new style and pressed the space bar ...and nothing! it reverts to black and white. I checked the fill color, line color and the line width in my new wing style.

I think my original wing has two different "styles"?, it may have an outline of black along with the other style I have saved with the colored in alpha and colored veins inside the wing. Would that make sens?

when I use just the select shape on the second wing it displays the fill as white and the outline as black but when I click with the create shape tool (it makes a red and white checkered pattern on the wing) which I then try to use the new style and press the space bar but it reverts to fill white and outline black. I also noticed that when I click on the edge of the wing with the select shape tool the fill and line check boxes are not checked but when I click inside the wing they all are checked. They are also unchecked when I use the create shape tool, I hope this information actually helps?! I seem to have created quite a mess of things I have to laugh though because this is not what I thought would stop me in my tracks, I am just trying to color in a wing for goodness sake!

Best bet is to start "from scratch" just for learning purposes.

1. Create a style by selecting "new" from the style palette. Give it a unique color so you can tell when it gets applied to your shape properly.

2. Create a simple shape on a vector layer.

At this point the shape is still selected. If it isn't use the select shape tool to select the new shape. At the bottom of the style palette are two drop down menus under "Applied Styles".

3. Click on the first applied styles drop down menu and choose the style you created in step 1.

There tends to be a lot of confusion regarding the select shape tool and the create shape tool. They are right next to each other in the tool palette. Select shape is first and Create shape is second.

Make sure when you are applying a style to an existing shapr or changing a style and the shape already exists that you use the SELECT shape tool. If you use the create shape tool and hit the space bar it will delete the shape that was there before.

It sounds like you are trying to "apply" styles by using the create shape tool. Once a shape is created you just select it and use the "Applied Styles" palettes to use named styles.

Let me know if you need more help.

-vern

I couldn't connect to this server last night so I am thanking you this morning! Thank you so much for clarifying the styles for me. I finally got it right, I hope anyway! My wings look fine now. Apparently it was like I thought, I had an outline style as well as fill style and the outline was over riding the new style I was trying to place on it. I deleted the outline and was finally able to apply the fill. Phew, all that to color in a wing!
With all these questions you've been so patiently answering I don't see how you are able to get all your own stuff done! You must be very good at multitasking!

I do see however the urge to help anyone I can even though I just started myself. This is such a cool program with so little help so anything I can contribute I will too.

Just out of curiosity, would I need to know how to do scripting to become successful with AS? That was my nemesis with Flash, I just had such a hard time with actionScript.

giselle wrote:Just out of curiosity, would I need to know how to do scripting to become successful with AS? That was my nemesis with Flash, I just had such a hard time with actionScript.

The success is not in the tool you use. It is in how you use them and what you want to tell.
-G

The success is not in the tool you use. It is in how you use them and what you want to tell.

Of course it is! I agree 100% Maybe I didn't formulate my question correctly. Since I am new to As I am asking those of you who have achieved success with As and As only, whether or not it is possible to do so without the knowledge of scripting? I ask basically because I find it difficult to script, as it was a great pain for me to learn even the basics of actionScript in Flash so if I have to learn Lua I will have to find a way to integrate this in my learning curb as well as adjusting to AS as a whole. I would personally like to never have to script anything ever again but I also want my work to be the best it can be. If my question cannot be answered because of the lack of knowledge I gave to what kind of work I want to achieve then I apologize for that. I am leaning towards creating a cartoon animation similar to lets say the Simpsons meets Fairly Odd Parents. Now I don't think for a minute that I will achieve that level of greatness anytime in the very near future but I am going to try. I have great writers and sound people now all I need is to get comfortable with AS. I can draw quite well with AS, I didn't find it difficult to adjust to that part at all, in fact I liked the challenge but the timeline and the layers are a bit difficult to get used to and the more I read in this forum the more I see references to scripting and there wasn't much mention of it in the manual so I was assuming/hoping it wasn't necessary/important. (at least where animating was concerned!) With Flash I could keyframe everything if I wanted and I would still get pretty good results but the real power was in the actionscript. I liked the idea of AS over keyframing in Flash because I thought using bones would facilitate the animating part that would take so much longer in Flash using keyframe animation. Sure the tweening helped a bit but AS seems to have that down perfectly! So you see all I want to know is in general one who wants to put out a cartoon lets say for Teletoon, would one need to know lua? (I know, I know, why the long story when you could have just asked the darn question)

No, you don't need to become good with scripting to use AS. I think this is one of the things the creator of AS struggled with, he didn't want to put too much focus on scripting and make people think you have to be a programmer just to animate.

AS works great straight out of the box. Because of the scripting feature YOU as a non "scripter" can download better tools from those of us who are.

You do not need knowledge of lua or scripting to become proficient with AS! At most all you would need to know is how to put a custom script inside your tool folder, or how to add a layer script.... but only if you wanted to take advantage of that!

Using scripts and CREATING scripts are two completely different things.

Just remember that ALL of the tools of AS are just... scripts. That is why we can change them, improve them, create new ones. All the tools are based on the same scripting language.

If you decide that you don't want to bother with learning to script, no worries. You can still benefit from those of us who do. I was using all kinds of scripts and custom tools when I first bought Moho. I had NO idea how to script at all. I found it interesting and I had experience with Action script and Javascript so I just taught myself.

-vern

Phew! Thanks Vern! That takes a load off my mind. I will certainly take advantage of other's scripts but I do believe my scripting days will be over if I don't have to I probably won't. My passion is art not programming, although my husband really wishes I would do more programming! I just don't enjoy the process of programming as much as I do drawing and animating. I used to have my oldest son program my stuff in Flash for me when I made things like MP3 players and the such. I would do all the graphics and the basic actionscript but I would hand it over to someone else for the harder stuff because I would be at it for weeks when it just took them a few minutes! I do admit that programming is very rewarding but still not my cup of tea! Thanks for clearing that up for me , I won't have to stress over it any longer. I was quite content with the little bit of animation I have done so far with AS and really didn't see why I would need any scripting but I didn't think that of Flash either when I first bought it many years ago.

That is why I think AS is one of the coolest programs out there. I am an artist as well... but... the darn left side of my brain gets jealous and loves to fiddle with the code.

I get to satisfy both sides of my brain using AS!

Lately I have nearly as much fun scripting as animating and creating.

-vern