A FlipBook is the easiest way there is to do hand-drawn animation. You just draw one picture after another on a little pad of paper and then flip the pages to see it move. Now, with DigiCel FlipBook, animation gets even easier. Whether you draw right on the computer or still want to use pencil and paper, you can paint and play your animation on your computer with sound and record it to video tape, CD, DVD or post it on the Internet for the whole world to see. You can even include live action video and 3D animation in your movies. And if you need a little help you can trace or rotoscope your drawings from comic books or live action video. And FlipBook is great for stop motion animation too, so even if you can't draw you can still animate with DigiCel FlipBook.
DigiCel FlipBook is very easy to use. This User's Guide is organized like a tutorial that will lead you through the process of making your own movies step by step. It covers all of the features of FlipBook Pro, our high-end, professional version. Some of the features described here may not be available if you have a different version.
Installing DigiCel FlipBook is just as easy as using it.
PC |
Mac |
To install FlipBook on a PC... 1. Put the FlipBook CD in your CD-ROM drive. 2. Open a window to view the CD-ROM. 3. Double-Click on the Windows folder. 4. Double-Click on the Setup program. 5. Click on Next to start the installation and follow the prompts. |
To install FlipBook on a Mac… 1. Put the FlipBook CD in your CD-ROM drive. 2. Double-Click on the CD-ROM icon. 3. Double-click on the Mac folder. 4. Double-click on the DMG file to decompress it. 5. Drag the Flipbook application icon into your Applications folder. |
FlipBook is delivered in trial mode. All of the features are enabled but there is a watermark in the images you create. Once you purchase a FlipBook license you can unlock FlipBook and you will be able to create new scenes without the watermark. If you have a DigiCel Portable License Key just plug the key into a USB port before you start FlipBook.
FlipBook creates a unique ID on each computer when it is installed. If you didn’t order a Portable License Key with your copy of FlipBook then you can get a FlipBook Key Code to unlock FlipBook by sending in the FlipBook ID for the computer you want to run FlipBook on. The Key Code will unlock the features for the version of FlipBook that you ordered so you can create scenes without the watermark on that computer. After that, you will be able to download any free updates without having to unlock FlipBook again. If you upgrade to a newer or a more powerful version of FlipBook, we just send you a new key code to unlock the new features.
To start FlipBook and unlock it. . .
PC |
Mac |
Start > Programs > FlipBook > Unlock. |
Go > Applications
> FlipBook |
If you’re already in FlipBook, click on. . .
PC |
Mac |
Help > Unlock |
FlipBook > Unlock |
Copy and paste the FlipBook ID into an email along with your name and order number or other proof of purchase and send it to unlockflipbook@digicel.net. When you receive the key code, copy and paste it into the FlipBook Key Code edit box and click OK.
DigiCel FlipBook follows the same process that has been part of traditional cel animation for over fifty years. If you have an animation background FlipBook will be very easy and intuitive. If you are new to cel animation you will be able to learn the traditional method of doing cel animation while you learn to use FlipBook. Either way the process is fun and easy. When you start FlipBook you will get a Start-Up Dialog where you can choose to create a new scene or open an existing scene.
FlipBook consists of two main windows, the Image Window and the Xsheet. The image window is where you will draw, paint and preview your movies.
The tool bar has icons for several options that you will use frequently in FlipBook. Under the View menu, you can customize the tool bar to select which icons you want in the tool bar.
Here is a brief description of the common icons. New,
Open,
Save,
Cut,
Copy,
Paste,
Undo,
Redo,
Print.
The following icons may require a little more explanation.
The Color icon lets you switch between the
Color mode and B&W or gray scale mode. In the Color mode you can see the
Color Palette or Color Model and the additional tools in the Tool Box for
painting. Your animation will also play back in color.
The Capture icon brings up the Capture
dialog box so you can adjust your settings and capture drawings directly into
the xsheet. You can also capture directly into the xsheet by pressing the F8
key. This uses the current capture settings but bypasses the Capture dialog.
The Scanner icon opens the Scanner dialog
box. Scanning gives you the best quality but takes a little longer.
This icon turns the `Light Table' on and
off. In the Light Table Options dialog under the Options menu you can select
which images you want to see when the light is on. This is similar to the onion
skin feature in other programs but goes way beyond what they can do.
This icon controls whether or not the background
image (BG) will be displayed in the image window during editing.
The Camera icon lets you toggle in and out
of Camera mode and brings up the Camera Move dialog box so you can compose your
key frames to add camera moves like pan, zoom and rotate to your scenes.
The Boomerang icon passes images from
FlipBook to your favorite graphics editing program so you can edit them there
and have your changes show up in FlipBook.
This icon switches you back and forth
between viewing thumbnail images in the xsheet or just their labels.
This icon turns the AutoSave feature on
and off. When AutoSave is on the changes that you make to the drawings in the
Image Window are automatically saved whenever you go to a different image. If
AutoSave is off you will be prompted whether or not to save your changes.
This icon turns the xsheet on or off.
This icon shows or hides the sound level
in the xsheet.
The Tone Matte icon brings up the Layer
dialog box so you can select which tone matte layer you want to work with and set
its values. Tone mattes are used to create shadows, glows and highlights. This
is only available with FlipBook Pro.
At the bottom of the image window are controls, like those on a DVD player. They can be used at any time to play back the active levels of your scene or view any frame you want to see. From left to right the buttons are: Stop, Home, Reverse, Step Backward, Pause, Step Forward, Play, End and Loop. The buttons are a little different on the Mac but should be self explanatory.
The next two buttons adjust the playback rate, even while the scene is playing. This can also be done with the plus (+) and minus (-) keys. The current rate is displayed at the bottom of the Image Window.
To the right of the DVD controls there is a Slider. You
ca drag the pointer to move forward and backward through the scene without
audio. The arrow buttons at each end let you set start and stop points for compositing
and playback.
In FlipBook, as in traditional animation, the scene information is stored in an exposure sheet or xsheet. The xsheet is made up of rows and columns. Every row is a frame and every column is a level. The scene starts at the top of the xsheet and continues downward, like film going through a camera. The levels start with the background on the right and the foreground on the left.
FlipBook Lite has 2 levels, a background and a foreground. FlipBook Studio has up to 6 levels including the background. FlipBook Pro can have up to 100 levels.
You can move around in the xsheet in the normal way you control windows using the scroll bars at the right and bottom edge of the window. You can make the xsheet larger to display more frames or levels by dragging on the borders of the xsheet (bottom right corner only on the Mac).
You can edit the xsheet using simple Drag and Drop procedures, the standard Cut, Copy and Paste commands or the Insert and Delete commands under the Edit menu.
Each level can be enabled or disabled independently. This determines which of the levels you will see when you play the scene in the Image Window. Double-Click on the level header at the top of the column to turn each level on or off as desired.
Active levels have a green background behind the name of the level. Inactive levels have a gray background. FlipBook will automatically re-composite the preview and update the Image Window to reflect your changes.
By default each level, except the background, is numbered from right to left as in a traditional xsheet. You can rename any level by right-clicking (control+click on the Mac) on the label and typing the new name into the edit box.
As new images are added they will be labeled using the current label of their level as a prefix along with their frame number. In the capture, scan and import dialogs there is a Label edit box where you can add a numeric suffix for the cel labels.
After you set the suffix for the first image of the level, FlipBook will increase the numeric suffix automatically so the label for each cel in the xsheet will match the drawing it came from. You can also add an a, b, etc. following the number as needed to match extra in-between drawings.
FlipBook also has an option to display miniature versions of your images, called thumbnails, in the xsheet along with the labels. This makes it much easier to see what's happening in your scenes. The thumbnail images also reflect the painting, making it easy to see how much of the scene has already been painted. You can control whether the thumbnails are visible or not by clicking on the Thumbnail icon above the Image Window.
Generally the background is a static image that is held throughout the scene. In fact, a change of background is what normally defines the beginning of a new scene. But in FlipBook the background itself can also be animated allowing it to change from frame to frame. You can scan, import or even capture background images under a camera. You can even import live action video or 3D animation to be used as a background. To edit the background, use the Boomerang feature, which opens the background in your favorite paint program so you will have all of its features available.
There are two ways to control the timing of the animation. One way is to adjust the playback rate, which is measured in frames per second. You can also temporarily change the rate during playback by pressing the up and down arrows under the Image Window or the + and – keys on the keyboard while the Image Window is active.
The other way to control timing is through the number of frames for which each drawing is displayed. If the drawings are positioned in consecutive frames then the animation is said to be 'on 1's' and a sequence of 24 drawings would last one second at the standard film rate of 24 fps (frames per second).
But if the drawings are positioned in every 2nd frame then the animation is said to be 'on 2's' and the same 24 drawings would be spread out over 48 frames lasting two seconds at 24 fps. So the movement would only be half as fast. This is the standard timing used in most cartoons.
If there is no new image in the frame immediately below, then the drawing is held through the next and any following empty frames. So if there are 5 empty positions below an image in the xsheet then that image will be displayed for an additional 5 frames making a total of 6 frames. This typically represents a pause in the animation and is often referred to as a 'hold'. A vertical line is place in the squares below to show that the drawings are held.
There are times when you will want drawings to disappear from the level, either temporarily or permanently. To stop a drawing from being displayed in future frames you should insert a 'Blank Cel' in the square where the image disappears. The Insert Blank Cel command is under the Edit menu and blank cels are identified in the xsheet with an X whenever thumbnails are on.
To create a new scene, click on File > New.
Although you can set the properties for the new scene in the New dialog, all you really have to do is set the frame size (and OverScan if you’re going to use it). Everything else, like the length of the scene, the playback rate and the number of levels can be changed anytime.
The frame size is very important and is just about the only thing you can’t change once you’ve created a scene. It is usually determined by the way your movie will be distributed. The frame size controls how big the picture will be in the final movie.
For television you will want to use either NTSC, the standard for North America, Asia and Brazil or PAL, the European standard. If you need to use a resolution that is different than the standard sizes select the Custom setting in the New dialog, and enter the desired values for with and height.
For the Internet, you can pick any size you want but remember that bigger frame sizes (and higher frame rates) will require longer download times and will not play as smoothly on slower computers or internet connections.
Both PAL and NTSC formats actually allow more than one frame size. Now days, PAL is usually 720 X 576 and NTSC is usually 720 X 480. This is determined by the hardware you use to output your animation for TV.
Both of these standard sizes use non-square pixels to make up the image. Computers generally work with square pixels. The best way to handle this difference is to set the frame size to a larger, square-pixel frame size and then scale the final output down as needed.
For NTSC you should use 720 X 540 and for PAL you should use 768 X 576 as the frame size and then during the Export step FlipBook can scale the output down to 720 X 480 or 720 X 576 as needed. This let’s you work with the correct aspect ratio on the computer and then delivers the correct aspect ratio for broadcast on TV.
This is the speed at which your storyboard panels or animation will play back. Your final playback speed is also determined by the final output. For NTSC TV it should be 30 fps. For PAL it will be 25 fps. For files to be played over the Internet it should be around 10 or 12 fps.
Note: While doing storyboards or playing animatics, you may want to set a slower frame rate (2-4 fps) so you can have longer sequences adding up to several minutes, in one manageable file and you can watch the whole thing playback, properly timed out with the soundtrack and camera moves.
The average scene is about six seconds long, which is less than two hundred frames. But FlipBook will let you have up to one thousand frames in each xsheet, which is more than enough for a 30 second scene or a complete TV commercial. (FlipBook Lite can only have 300 frames.)
Note: For color scenes FlipBook needs 1 MB of RAM per frame to play back smoothly.
FlipBook Lite has 2 levels, a foreground and a background. FlipBook Studio can have up to 6 levels including the background. FlipBook Pro can have up to 100 levels. To add levels after the scene has already be created click on Edit > Append a Level. You cannot delete levels but as long as there’s nothing in them and they are turned off they don’t affect performance so there’s no need to delete them.
OverScan should always be set to 100% unless you will be zooming way in on the artwork. For details on OverScan please see the Scanning section.
The first thing to cover when talking about drawing on a computer is what you're going to use to draw. FlipBook lets you draw with either a mouse or a tablet or both. Drawing with a mouse is convenient because everybody has one, but it's not as natural as drawing with a pen or pencil. Using a graphics tablet and a cordless pen offers a much easier and more natural way to draw. It also gives you better results with less effort.
In gray scale mode the Tool Box contains a Pencil, Eraser, Magnifying Glass a Hand for moving the image around within the Image Window and a Selection tool to select part of the image to be cut or copied.
The Tool Box holds all of your editing tools.
The Pencil is for drawing the lines.
The Magnifying Glass lets you zoom in to get better control
over both drawing and erasing. Click or drag on the image with Magnifying glass
to zoom in. Hold the Control key or the Alt key and click to zoom back out.
Control+Alt+0 will reset the zoom value to 100%.
The Hand lets you move the image around within the
Image Window whenever the image is larger than the window. While in the drawing
mode, you can also press the space bar to temporarily make the cursor turn into
the Hand and allow you to move the image within the Image Window.
The Eraser works in conjunction with each of the
other drawing tools and can be used to erase either lines or fills. For
example, when the Pencil and the Eraser are selected you can erase lines drawn
by the Pencil.
The Selection Tool is used to select any part of the image
you want to cut, copy or paste. When you paste the image back in to a cel you can
also scale and/or rotate it.
Some tools have attributes that you can control. You can access the tool attributes by right-clicking (Control+click on the Mac) on the tool or by holding the cursor down on the tool in the tool box.
Pressing the Shift key will make the rectangle tool draw squares and the ellipse tool draw circles. The Alt key will make the Ellipse tool draw circles starting from where you drag.
The T1, T2 and T3 options are different line textures to choose from.
You can also choose between left or right-handed cursors as well as “simple” cursors that just use a circle and/or a cross hair. These controls are in the tools in the Settings dialog, which can be accessed through the Options menu on the PC or FlipBook > Preferences on the Mac.
Whether you want to animate straight ahead or do the key frames and then the inbetweens, FlipBook’s Light Table automatically shows you everything you need to see. The Light Box Options are in the Options menu.
Animating straight ahead is when you start with the first drawing of the sequence and then do number two and number three one after the other. When you select the Straight Ahead option in FlipBook’s Light Table you can see up to five previous drawings to help you know how much to move the character in the next drawing.
The other common way to do animation is to draw the key frames first and then do the drawings in between the key frames. This is particularly helpful when your character has to complete its action or be in a certain place at a specific time.
Selecting FlipBook’s Inbetween option shows you the previous and the next images for any drawing that you’re working.
The reference level feature lets you select and display the relevant images from up to four additional levels to help you see what’s going on around the drawing that you’re working on. So if you have a character whose body is one level one while his mouth is on level two and his eyes are on level three you can see all three levels and the background while you’re working on any one of them. Click the check box to enable the control and enter the number of the level you want to see. This also comes in very handy for painting but we’ll talk about that in the painting section.
Double-Clicking on a thumbnail or an empty square in the xsheet will open it for editing in the Image Window. The background color behind the thumbnail of the open cel will be green to let you know which one is currently open. Any changes you make to the drawing will be reflected in the thumbnail after you save your changes. The thumbnails will also show the colors that have been painted making it easy to see what has been done and what hasn’t.
While you’re in Editing Mode you can move around in the xsheet using the cursor keys to edit or paint different drawings.
To start drawing...
1.
Select the pencil tool.
2. Double-click on a foreground cel you want to draw in.
3. Draw in the Image Window.
If the AutoSave feature is on your drawing will be saved
when you select a different cel to draw in.
FlipBook can automatically copy the drawing from the current frame into the next frame so you can add to it or edit the part that moves and only have to draw that part in the new frame. To do this just press F7 once you’ve finished drawing the current frame.
You can Undo and Redo
up to 20 sequential edits to
the drawing by clicking on the appropriate icons.
Most of the better animators use the Flip or Roll method to control their drawings. They begin with an initial character pose on a single sheet of paper. Then they add a second sheet of paper on top of the first and draw a new pose with one hand, while they flip or roll the two drawings back and forth between their fingers to ensure accurate placement and size for each aspect of the character. This continuous process of flipping & drawing allows animators to preview their motion as they create it. Traditionally up to 4 or 5 sheets could be flipped with one hand while the other hand draws. The Enter key will Flip forward and the Backspace key Flips backward. If the Light Table is on, only the specified drawings will be flipped. If the Light Table is Off, FlipBook will play the entire scene. After the drawings play, you will be returned to the drawing you were editing.
NOTE: The Image Window must be the active window for the Enter Key or the Backspace to work.
You can also press the Shift key and then drag the cursor left and right across the image to Scrub back and forth through the drawings on the light box. This only plays the drawings that are on the light box without any compositing.
You can also Scrub through the entire scene by holding the Control key when you start dragging the cursor. This will let you see how the drawings you are working on fit in to the whole scene. The effect is the same as clicking on the Pause button in the DVD controls and then scrubbing the cursor in the Image Window. It plays the composited files that are made up of the 'Active' levels.
Note: Scrubbing through the images on the light box or the scene does not work when the pencil is set to draw rectangles or ellipses because those features use the shift and control keys for other purposes.
You can select part of an image and cut or copy it and then scale and/or rotate it as you paste it back into the same image or into another image.
To Cut or Copy and Paste partial images . . .
1.
Drag the select tool, to select the area you want to cut or
copy.
2. Cut or Copy the image using the icons, menus or the short cut keys.
3. Paste the image using the icon, menu or short cut keys.
4. Drag inside the bounding box to move it.
5. Drag on the edges or the corners to scale it.
6. Press Control and drag on the corners to rotate it.
7. Press escape to remove the rotation if necessary.
8. Click outside the bounding box to apply your changes.
Image
Clean-Up
You can also use the selection to help clean-up your images by
cutting everything inside the selected area with the standard “cut” keyboard
short. But FlipBook also has another short cut, Control+Shift+X
(Command+Shift+X on the Mac), that lets you cut everything that is outside the
box instead of what’s inside.
You can also make the selection box stay in the Image Window as you move from frame to frame by setting the Persist attribute in the Attributes dialog for the select tool. If you turn on the AutoAdvance option you can easily cut the same area again and again, frame after frame by only pressing Control+Shift+X (Command+Shift+X on the Mac) repeatedly.
Rotoscoping is a traditional animation technique that professional animators use to capture the movement of something that would be too hard to animate free hand. It is also referred to as Using Live Action Reference. It involves tracing the movement of a live action character acting out the movement that you want. It could be a basketball player, a ballerina, or anyone performing a difficult movement. This movement is then used as a reference and the animator adjusts the movement to convey the desired feeling of the scene.
To Rotoscope . . .
1. Import a Movie into the background.
2.
Display the background .
3.
Turn off the Light Table .
4. Double-click on the foreground frame that you want to trace into.
5. Trace the outline of the object from the background into the foreground.
6. Go on to the next frame.
Shooting your paper drawings under a video camera is the fastest way to get them into FlipBook to see them play. It's perfect for testing your rough drawings when you're more interested in quick results than in picture quality. It’s also the way to do stop motion animation.
Images captured into the background level are automatically saved in color. Images captured into the foreground levels are normally saved in gray scale (like pencil lines) but can be saved in color as well.
The only reason to capture color images into the foreground, rather than the background, is if you still want part of the background to be seen in the frame. That means that part of the color image in the foreground must be transparent. FlipBook gives you two ways to do this. You can select any shade of white (measured 0-255) and make everything whiter than that become transparent (just like we do when capturing pencil drawings) or you can pick any color in the image and key it out like they do to show the weatherman in front of the maps and other images.
To get into Capture Mode, highlight the square in the xsheet
where you want the first image to go and click on the Capture icon to bring up
the Capture dialog.
Images captured into the background are always opaque and in color. Images captured into the foreground can be in gray scale or in color and normally will include an alpha channel so that part of the image can be transparent.
FlipBook automatically makes the white part of your pencil drawings transparent, just like it would be traditional animation cels and it gives you two ways to enhance the quality of the results.
The White threshold lets you make light gray pixels become pure white. This is to make the "paper" disappear so you just see the pencil lines. Reduce the White threshold to make the paper disappear but keep as much of the light pencil lines as you can.
Increasing the Gamma setting boosts the darkness of the light gray pixels that are not forced to be white by the white threshold setting. This is to make sure even the light lines show up.
To Capture Pencil Drawings . . .
1. Select Gray.
2. Use the White and Gamma sliders to improve the image quality.
3. Put each drawing on a peg bar below the camera.
4. Click on Capture to capture each image.
Once you’ve captured the first image, you can also press the enter key or the space bar to capture images. They will be held for the number of frames specified in the Hold edit box. You can also press a number key (1-9) to automatically hold the image for that number of frames.
When you're through capturing drawings click on Quit to save your settings and exit the Capture mode. Your scene will automatically begin compositing and you can press the Play button in the DVD control panel at the bottom of the Image Window to see it start playing immediately.
FlipBook has two options for making part of a color image in the foreground become transparent so you can see through the transparent part to the background.
The easiest keying option is to key out the white in the image. This is the same as what FlipBook does when scanning or importing overlays. In this method you just set a white level and any pixels whose RGB values are all greater than the threshold become transparent.
Color keying let’s you drop out any color you want. Most often this is done by shooting against a blue or green screen. But FlipBook lets you key out any color and adjust the tolerance to include nearby shades. You even get four different ways to measure color. Each one produces different results with different lighting and colors. Try each one to see which works best in each situation.
Color Keying is really useful in stop motion because it lets you superimpose what you’re shooting onto any background or video you can get your hands on, including live action and 3D animation. It also lets you rotoscope your stop motion animation by superimposing your stop motion animation over live action video so you can pose your characters to match the action in the video.
To Capture Color Images . . .
1.
Select White Key and set the White threshold value (0-255).
or
Select Color Key and open the Color Settings dialog.
2. Click on the Key Color button and then click and hold briefly on the color in the image that you want to make transparent.
3. Then adjust the tolerance to key out any additional shades as well.
4. When the keying looks the way you want it to click on OK to save your settings and return to the Capture Dialog.
FlipBook gives you several ways to preview the images that will be captured into the xsheet. In addition to being able to mix the live camera feed with background and or previous FlipBook also lets you use the cursor keys to step back through previously captured frames and see them mixed the same way. This helps you get a good feel for how the next frame needs to be composed to make the animation continue as expected.
The Live Only option disables all of FlipBook’s special viewing options so you can see exactly what’s coming out of the camera. Capture always starts with this setting so you can be sure the camera is working.
The Normal preview option shows you the camera image when an empty square in the xsheet is highlighted. If the highlighted square in the xsheet already contains an image then you will see that image.
The Keyed option uses a technique called color keying to make one of the colors in the live image transparent so you can see through to the background. FlipBook offers a white keying option that works the same during capture as it does during scanning or importing images. But there is also a color keying option that will let you choose any color you want to key out. This feature lets you replace the actual background with any other background you choose, including live action or 3D animation.
The Alternate Lines option lets you see the live image interlaced with the background so you can see how the two levels line up.
The Show Previous option displays the previous image along with the live camera feed. Or when you use the cursor keys to step back through previously captured frames it lets you see the selected frame and the one immediately before it.
This area lets you control where the next image will be positioned in the xsheet and what it will be named.
Shooting your drawings under a camera is great because it's so fast and easy. But to make the drawings look as good as possible you need to spend a little time in the beginning to get things set up correctly. Here are the things to do in the recommended order.
These settings are for the camera itself. It is important to get the camera set up properly before you go on to the other settings.
Position the camera as close to the drawings as possible so you can still see all of the drawing area. Then set the focus. For best results connect the camera to a video monitor and focus it manually.
Note: Depending on your camera and capture card you may find that you like the image better if the camera is just a little bit out of focus. This will give you a softer line.
Manually adjust the brightness to make the image a bright as you can without making the pencil lines fade out or disappear.
Whether your camera is plugged into a capture card or into the computer via FireWire, USB or possibly a parallel port there should be some settings offered by the manufacturer to control how the image will look. Click on the Settings button in the Capture Dialog for these settings.
The items on the Device Options list are determined by the camera manufacturer and vary widely. Here are the most common options.
This lets you select which input your camera is hooked up to such as composite (RCA) and S-VHS.
This is where you tell the camera what size picture you want to grab and what format to use. The size should match the frame size of the FlipBook scene and the format should be RGB 24 but other formats may also work. If you don’t get a picture in the image window try all of the options.
You may need to select a tab that says something like “Video Proc Amp” to get to the controls. (We have no control over this. It is controlled entirely by the device driver.) When you find the image quality controls you should try to get the picture to be as bright as you can without washing out the pencil lines.
Higher contrast will make the lines stand out more from the paper. Lower settings will keep more of the subtleties in your lines. Pick a balance between contrast and brightness that you like.
This is a color setting. For pencil drawings it is best to set the saturation to zero if you can.
This controls the image size for digital video cameras.
The check boxes in the Capture Settings Dialog help you set other values to get the results you want.
Most cameras only have a tripod mount on the bottom so when they are mounted on a copy stand the images appear up-side-down. FlipBook can rotate the images 180 degrees for viewing and saving to get the right-side-up again.
Digital video cameras usually capture at 720 X 480. Since this is not a true 4:3 aspect ratio, round objects look short and fat. FlipBook can stretch these images vertically to 720 X 540 to correct the aspect ratio and make them look like they should on the computer. Then when it’s time to export your movie FlipBook will scale the images down to 720 X 480 if you want.
This feature was added to make up for capture cards like some of those from Pinnacle where the designers took short cuts in developing the driver for their cards and combined several different dialogs into one. If you’re still using the Studio DC10+ or AV 7/8 from Pinnacle Systems (and you’re unwilling to change to a newer, better product) you must temporarily turn off the video stream to be able to change the frame size. Then you will have to turn it back on to change the other settings.
Sometimes the camera gets moved and you need to realign the live image to match up with drawings you already captured. FlipBook lets you mix the scan lines of the live image and a previously captured image to help you get the camera back into the correct place.
To realign the camera . . .
1. Place the last drawing that you captured on the peg bar.
2. Open the Capture dialog
3. Select Alternate lines and Show Previous.
4. Re-adjust the camera until the two images match up.
You can also step back and forth between the previous image and the live image using the cursor keys.
FlipBook is great for doing stop motion animation too. For simple stop motion animation you can capture your images directly into the background level of FlipBook’s exposure sheet where frames are automatically added as the scene gets longer and then play the scene back immediately with the sound track. Having the images in the exposure sheet makes it easy to see what’s going on in the scene and lets you edit the scene any way you want.
But you can also capture your animation into the foreground and key out any solid color so that you can superimpose your animation on to any type of background you want like a photo, a live action video or even 3D animation.
Whether you’re substituting an alternate background or not, the most important thing about stop motion animation is to get your character’s movement right frame after frame. FlipBook gives you several ways to do this.
The Continuous Play/Capture feature works without even going into FlipBook’s dedicated capture mode. It lets you play your animated scene repeatedly adding the live image from the camera on to the end of the scene with the touch of a button. Just set your scene to loop and then press Play. Now each time you press F8 FlipBook will add the live camera frame on to the end of the scene and keep playing so you can add another frame.
In capture mode you can you use the cursor keys to step back and forth through the previous frames to see how much the image has moved frame by frame in the past and when you get back to the empty frame you will see the live image so you can preview how it will look added onto your scene before you even capture it.
FlipBook also lets you create on screen position markers so you can plan out where you want your object to be several frames ahead of time. These markers are displayed during capture so you can pose your character accordingly but they can be turned off to keep them from showing up in the playback version of the film.
The position markers are drawn into one or more frames in the foreground level. You can draw all of the position markers into one frame so you can see them all or you can draw each position marker into its own frame. Either way the marker you need is there to help you position your character for each frame and guarantees that you’ll get to the right place at the right time.
The Show Previous option lets you see the live camera image and the previous image at the same time. This makes it easy to see exactly how much your character has moved since the last frame so to help you make the movement consistent for each frame. And FlipBook has two ways to combine the previous image with the live image.
The Alternate Lines option in the Capture Dialog let’s you see all the odd lines of the live image and all the even lines of the previous image at the same time. This works in both the foreground and the background.
If you shoot your animation in front of a solid colored background FlipBook can subtract the background from the image so you can see both the frame you’re about to capture and the frame you already captured. If you have the background turned on you can also see the background along with the next and the previous images.
With FlipBook’s color keying feature you can also use rotoscoping to help you with your stop motion. Just import a movie into the background level of someone doing what you want your animated character to do and then pose the character to match each frame of the movie and the animation will be perfect. (See the section on capturing color images for details on how to use the color key option.)
Scanning is the best way to get your drawings or color backgrounds into FlipBook for painting. And FlipBook makes it easier than ever. It positions your images directly in the Xsheet as you scan so you don’t have to scan in some other program and then import them into FlipBook. If your scanner is big enough to scan the peg holes as well as the drawing you can use AutoScan Plug-In to save time, wear and tear on your drawings and to make sure your images are properly registered. If your scanner isn’t that big then you should tape a peg bar to the scanner along the side of the glass and you're ready to go.
DigiCel FlipBook uses the industry standard TWAIN interface to talk to scanners. You will need a scanner that is TWAIN compatible and be sure the TWAIN driver is installed.
You should scan your pencil drawings in black & white mode at 200 dpi or higher for most circumstances. Your drawings will automatically be cleaned up, rotated and positioned in the exposure sheet on 1's, 2's, 3’s or at any interval you select in the Hold edit box. Color drawings only need to be scanned at about 75 dpi but make sure the Scale to Fit option is turned on if you want your BGs and overlays to be the same size as your cels.
AutoScan finds the peg holes in the image and registers the drawing saving you the time and trouble of putting each drawing on the peg bar and removing it. But in order for FlipBook to be able to find the holes and register the images, the holes must appear black. This means you need to put black tape on the scanner’s lid or behind the holes in the paper path of an automatic scanner.
AutoScan is activated by setting Rotation to AutoScan. To tell FlipBook where to look for the peg holes, you need to set the Field Size and the Offset. Field Size is the width of the image in inches and Offset is the distance from the center of the center peg to the center of the drawing. FlipBook normally expects the peg holes to be at the bottom of the image but you can also set it to handle images with the holes at the top.
Zooming in actually takes a small part of the image and stretches it to fill the frame. This requires creating more information than is actually there. The scaling in FlipBook is actually very good at this and for short zooms in the 0-30 or 40% range it will still look great. But if you want to zoom in more than that then you should set the OverScan setting when you create the scene and scan your images with a higher resolution.
The OverScan feature lets you start off with higher resolution images and scales them down when you don’t need the extra data.
If you want to zoom in to make half of the image fill the frame without losing any image quality then you should set the OverScan to 200% and you should double your scanning resolution. To zoom in even further, increase the OverScan value and the scanning resolution even more.
FlipBook will compensate as needed to make everything work the same but the image quality of your zooms will be perfect. Select the OverScan value that best suites the zoom requirements of the scene.
Note: Over scanning creates bigger images that will take more processing time, more memory and require a faster computer for smooth play back.
To scan your drawings directly into the xsheet . . .
1. Select the location in the xsheet into which you want to start scanning.
2.
Click on the Scan icon.
3. Set the rotation value as needed. (Auto is for AutoScan, see below.)
4. Click on Acquire.
This will bring up your scanner’s control program. We recommend the following settings. (For more information please follow the Scanning Tips link below.)
1. Set the image type to Black and White Drawing or Line Art.
2. Set the DPI to 200 or higher, especially if you are using OverScan.
3. Set the image area to 8.5 X 11.33 to maintain the correct aspect ratio.
4. Scan each drawing.
Note: If you want to scan into random locations you can set the Frame # and Level # in FlipBook's Scan dialog before each scan. You may want to position the Scan dialog and the scanner's control window so that they can both be seen at the same time.
When AutoHold is turned on FlipBook will automatically place each scanned image into the next frame that already has an image in it. Then you’re your final drawings are automatically timed out exactly the same as your rough drawings were.
FlipBook makes scanning very easy but there are a few other things you should understand and several things you can do to improve your results. For starters there are three different types of images in 2D animation and they each need to be handled differently
The word cel is short for celluloid, which is the transparent material that was used in the old days. Once the pencil drawings were cleaned-up, the lines were traced onto the cels with an ink pen. This made all the lines the same thickness and darkness and the rest of the image was transparent. Then the other side was painted with cel paint. This is where the term “ink & paint” comes from.
To recreate this situation and the benefits that it provides, FlipBook stores the ink in one file and creates a separate, transparent file for the paint and gives you separate tools to edit each one.
The best way to get nice, clean lines that look like they’ve been inked is to scan them in pure black & white at 200 – 300 DPI (4 or 5 times their original size) and then scale them down to fit the frame. This scaling smoothes the edges and makes the lines more consistent and easier to fill. FlipBook will automatically scale your line drawings to fit the frame.
If you want to retain a rough or textured look to the lines then you should scan them in gray scale at the actual resolution (see Scanning Resolution below). But this is a little more difficult because it involves setting both the contrast and the brightness to keep the lines dark enough and still make the paper pure white. If the paper isn’t pure white then it won’t fill properly. You also have to figure out what the actual resolution is (see Scanning Resolution below).
If you don’t want to do the math to figure out the actual resolution you can just scan them at 72-100 DPI and FlipBook will scale them to fit. But the more you go over the actual resolution the less texture you will get.
Backgrounds should always be scanned in 24-bit color. But they usually don’t need to be scanned at a high resolution and scaled down like cels. But sometimes backgrounds may need to be bigger than the frame so you can pan left and right or up and down. The normal way to do long backgrounds is to paint them on a long piece of paper and scan it in pieces at the actual resolution (see Scanning Resolution below). Then paste the pieces together (in a graphics editing program) to create a single long background file that you can import into FlipBook. But it might be easier to paint the background smaller and just scan it at a higher resolution to make it bigger on screen.
In the old days, background artists would paint part of the background or surrounding scenery on long sheets of celluloid that would be placed in front of the background and/or characters. Naturally, part of the celluloid would be left clear so the background and characters could show through. These overlays could then pan at a different rate and would add depth to the scene.
Now this is accomplished using 32-bit images that have what’s called an alpha channel to define which part of the image is supposed to be transparent to allow the characters or part of the background to show through.
Overlays are scanned just like backgrounds but somewhere along the line the alpha channel has to get created. The best way to do that is in a paint program that can handle transparency. But in simple cases, FlipBook can make the alpha channel for you.
If you turn the Overlay option on in the Scan dialog FlipBook will treat the image an overlay and make any white areas in the image transparent. The lower the number you put in the Keying edit box the darker the white can be and still become transparent.
Note: FlipBook is not designed to edit backgrounds or overlays. But these images can be edited using the Boomerang feature that actually launches Photoshop, or whatever your favorite image editing program is, and lets you edit these images there. For more information on this feature please refer to the painting section of the User’s Guide.
Most animation is done with a 4:3 aspect ratio because that’s the way most TVs are. Fortunately, most scanners are pretty much the same. They’re designed to handle 8.5 by 11.7 inches. Using an aspect ratio of 4:3, the largest drawing area you can scan with a normal scanner is 8.5 X 11.33. This is slightly less than standard animation paper but the difference is so little that it would end up off the screen anyway.
Whatever size or aspect ratio you choose to use, make sure to scan all of the drawings with the same settings. And the aspect ratio of the scanned area should match the aspect ratio of the screen.
To make a standard 12-field drawing (12-inch wide) fill the TV screen it should be scanned at a resolution of at least 60 dots per inch. But for best results you should scan at 200-300 dots per inch. FlipBook will automatically scale these images to fit the frame and this scaling process gets rid of the jaggies that you sometimes see when computer images are displayed on a TV, the higher the resolution the smoother the lines.
Backgrounds and overlays don’t need to be scaled like line drawings so they should usually be scanned at 60 DPI. If the Scale to Fit option is checked FlipBook will scale your BGs and overlays the fit the frame just like it scales the cels. This saves you from having to do the math and it guarantees excellent registration and improved image quality.
However, when you want the background or an overlay to be bigger than the cels so you can pan or zoom on it you must turn Scale to Fit off. Then the image size will be controlled by the scanning resolution.
To determine the actual resolution, divide the number of pixels you need to fill your frame in each direction (horizontal and vertical) by the size of the drawing in inches.
Here are two examples of how you do the math to make sure your drawings are the right size. These examples will create images that fill the frame correctly. To make a BG or an overlay that is twice as big as the frame, just double the scanning resolution.
When using normal animation paper with a 12-inch wide drawing area you divide 720 pixels by 12 inches, and you get 60 DPI. At 60 DPI your drawing, which is 9 inches tall, will be 540 pixels high. So use the 720 X 540 setting when creating new scenes and scan backgrounds at 60 DPI. Then scale the final output to 720 X 480 or whatever your output device requires. That will make the aspect ratio correct on the playback screen.
To create a 640 X 480 image from a drawing on normal size paper (8.5 X 11), you will first need to reduce the drawing size a little to allow for peg holes to be punched into the paper. So let’s make the drawing area 10 X 7.5. Divide 640 by 10 and you get 64 DPI. Multiple 64 DPI by the 7.5 and you get 480 so that works. Scan your BGs and Overlays at 64 DPI.
Darker images will generally look better but you don't want to get it too dark. Reduce the brightness until you start getting too many random dots in the image. These are usually dark spots on the paper or on the scanner's glass. Run some tests to find the results you like best based on your scanner, your paper and drawing style.
Before you start scanning you should tape a peg bar to the side of your scanner, unless you will be using the AutoScan feature. A thin peg bar will provide better registration than a thick one. It would be best to use a low profile metal peg bar. This will help maintain the registration of your drawings. The best way to position the peg bar is to place a transparent field guide on the peg bar and line it up to be centered over the scanner's glass. Then tape the peg bar securely to the scanner.
FlipBook lets you import movies or still images. Images imported into the background level will be in color and can be oversized for panning and zooming or scaled to fit the frame.
In the foreground, black & white or gray scale images will come in as line art. Color images with the necessary alpha channel (32-bit TGA files) will come in as overlays. If your color images aren’t already 32-bit files (with alpha channel for transparency) then turn on the Overlay check box and FlipBook will create an alpha channel making the pure white part of the image transparent. The Keying value lets you control how white the area must be to become transparent. Reducing the Keying value will make more of the light gray become transparent.
1. Highlight the first square in the xsheet into which you want the imported file(s) to go.
2. Click on File > Import.
3. Select Stills or Movie.
1.
Select the file(s) you want. (Use Shift to select a range of files. Use
Control to select several individual files.
2. If you are importing multiple files you can set the Hold to the number of frames for which you want each image to be displayed.
3. Click on Import.
1.
Locate the file you want to import. You can preview the
file in the little player in the Import AVI dialog (Open dialog on the Mac).
2. In case you don’t want to use the entire Movie file you may select which frames within the movie file you want to Import.
FlipBook lets you play your animation at any speed from 1 to 100 frames per second. You can also step through the scene, one frame at a time, in either direction using the cursor keys or scrub through the scene for complete control by dragging the cursor back and for in the image window.
You also get several options under the view menu for playback quality. Higher preview quality levels take a little longer to composite and require more RAM. Lower quality preview settings composite faster and require less RAM.
You can play your scene anytime by clicking on the PLAY button at the bottom of the image window. This plays the active levels, which are identified by a green header. To turn a level on or off, double-click on the label at the top of the level.
The up and down arrows adjust the playback rate, which is displayed in the status bar below the controls. You can also use the plus and minus keys to adjust the speed.
Clicking on the Goto button brings up an edit box to let you type in the number of the frame you want to go to.
Pressing the Stop button or selecting a tool from the Tool Box will take you back to the frame you were editing before you started playing.
The Slider control does two jobs. It lets you temporarily limit the playback and compositing to any part of the scene you want. The button at the left end of the slider sets the current frame as the start frame and the button on the right sets the stop frame. The blue area in the slider represents the part of the scene that will play when you press the play button.
It also lets you control playback by dragging the pointer back and forth. The faster you drag that faster the scene plays and the farther you drag the more frames you see. This is known as scrubbing. You can also drag the cursor within the image to scrub through the scene as well. Scrubbing in the image will include audio while scrubbing in the slider will not.
This is a very important part of the animation process and FlipBook provides several ways to edit the xsheet so you can use whichever way you like best. And you can do your editing while the scene is playing and see your changes immediately.
There are two kinds of editing. One kind adds or removes frames, changing the length of the movie. The other just moves drawings around in the existing frames. Insert and Delete affect the drawings AND the frames they are in. If you use Insert or Delete the drawings down below in the xsheet will either move up or down.
Drag & Drop and Cut, Copy and Paste only move images around without adding or removing frames.
Note: When you copy and paste cels the pasted cels will be linked to the original cels and when you edit either one you will have the option to update all of the copies or break the link.
Left-click in the xsheet to select a frame, level or square. To select a range of frames, levels or squares in the xsheet click and drag the cursor. When you select something in the xsheet the color of the background behind the thumbnails will turn blue so you can see what has been selected.
The Drag and Drop method has two options, Copy and Move.
1. Click and drag in the xsheet to highlight a square or a range.
2. Click within the highlight and Drag the cursor to the top right corner of the new position.
3. If you want to copy the drawings press the Control Key (Option Key on a Mac) BEFORE you drop them. Otherwise they will be moved.
If the target location contains any drawings you will be asked to confirm their replacement or cancel the process.
There are also three ways to Cut, Copy and Paste. You can use the Edit menu, the icons in the tool bar or the keyboard shortcuts. When you use the menu or the keyboard shortcuts you also have the option to ‘Paste Reversed’. This will reverse the order of the drawings as they are pasted back into the xsheet to make it easier to get the drawings in the right order for things like opening and closing doors where the drawings are used again but in reverse order.
1. Click and drag to highlight a square or a range in the xsheet.
2. Select Cut (to move the drawings) or Copy (to duplicate them) from the Edit menu.
3. Click on the top right corner of the target position for the cel(s).
4. Click on Paste.
If the target location contains any drawings you will be asked to confirm or cancel the process.
When you copy and paste images, the copies are ‘linked’ to the original. Any edits to the original or any of the copies will change every instance of the image unless you break the link when saving your changes.
NOTE: When more then one square or level is involved, the top right corner is used as the insertion point.
You can also Cut, Copy and Paste from one scene to another. To do this you should perform the cut or the copy and then open a new scene. Before FlipBook closes the first scene you will be asked if you want to save the data externally. Answer ‘Yes’ to this question and then paste the data into the new scene. If you do this with two scenes open in two difference instances of FlipBook running at the same time you can only go in one direction.
Inserting and deleting frames will make the scene longer or shorter respectively. You can insert or delete frames by clicking on the frame number where you want the edit to occur and then choosing Insert or Delete from the Edit menu. You can also right-click (control+click on the Mac) on the frame number to pop up a dialog with additional options.
The option to append more levels to a scene is found in the edit menu. It will add one more level to the left of the xsheet each time you click on it.
Inserting and deleting frames within multiple levels lets you change the timing in some levels without affecting the rest of the levels in the scene. One way to do this is just like inserting and deleting frames except you only highlight the squares within the levels where you want to Insert or Delete. The other way is a method we refer to as 'Sliding' because you will be able to 'slide' multiple drawings from the same frame up or down.
To slide a drawing up or down . . .
1. Click, drag and let go to select one or more drawings in the same frame.
2. Hold the Alt Key down (Command Key on the Mac).
3. Click and Drag the drawings up or down.
The rest of the drawings below will move up or down accordingly. When sliding up, if the target location contains any drawings you will be asked to confirm or cancel the process.
If you only want change the timing within one level you can use the number keys to set the number of frames for which the selected drawing is to be displayed. The real strength of this feature is that as soon as the timing of the selected drawing has been set to the correct number of frames the next drawing in the level is automatically highlighted and therefore by holding down the number key down you can change as many of the following drawings as you want to same timing.
Note: If you want to add from 10 and 99 frames between drawings hold the control key down and FlipBook will wait for two numbers to be pressed before adjusting the timing to the next drawing.
DigiCel FlipBook
makes it easy to import and synchronize your soundtracks to your animation.
You can import a soundtrack by clicking on File > Import > Sound and selecting the file you want to import or by dragging WAV file onto the xsheet. Then press the Alt key (Command key on a Mac) and slide it up or down to sync it to the animation.
You can also move the sound file up and down one frame at a time by holding down the Alt and Control keys and pressing the cursor keys.
For absolutely perfect synchronization, you can pick any point in the sound file (Audio Mark) and sync it to any frame (Video Mark) in the xsheet.
You can turn the sound on and off by double-clicking on the Sound label at the top of the sound level in the xsheet or with the Enable Sound check box in the import dialog.
FlipBook’s painting features are designed specifically for painting cel animation. For example, FlipBook stores the lines and the fills in separate files and edits them with separate tools. This simulates the traditional method of drawing on one side of the cel and painting on the other. It also allows the paint to go underneath the lines to eliminate jaggies and make sure there are no gaps. Once your scene has been painted FlipBook lets you change the color of any object throughout the entire scene by just changing the palette or model. To open an image for painting, just double-click on its thumbnail in the xsheet.
Note: If you make changes to drawings that exist more than once in the xsheet, you need to “break the link” between the originals and the copies or all instances of the drawings will get changed.
To break the link . . .
1. Edit any one of the copies of each image.
2. When asked to apply your edits to all copies select No, Break the Link.
Images that are scanned or captured under a camera often have small specks in them from dark spots on the paper or dust and dirt on the scanner or the camera lens. The Despeckle feature lets you get rid of those small specks very easily. While you’re in the image editing mode, press the F9 key to erase the smallest of specks and the F10, F11 and F12 keys to erase slightly larger specks. On the Mac use Command+F9-F12. You will see the results in the Image Window immediately.
You can also select a range of cels within a level and use the Despeckle Action to despeckle multiple images in a single step.
Flip is found under the Actions menu and lets you flip all of the selected cels in a single level either horizontally, vertically or both. This is a big time-saver as it lets you reuse animation in more ways.
Note: If a drawing is used more than once in a scene and more than one copy of the drawing is included in the range of drawings to be flipped, then the drawing will be flipped once for each occurrence in the range of drawings to be flipped.
When you are in Color mode you will see either the Color Palette or the Color Model. Each Color Palette has 256 colors and every level can have its own palette. You can change the color of any square in the color palette by right-clicking (control+click on the Mac) on the color square and selecting the color from the box or typing in the RGB or HSL values and the opacity. The palettes are stored in the scene files.
All scenes start off using the default palette. If you want to change the default color palette FlipBook will convert it to a Custom palette and the changes will only apply to the level in which the changes are made.
If you want multiple levels to share the same palette you can set any custom palette to be the scene palette. When you create a scene palette, any level that was using the default palette will start using the scene palette instead.
You can save your Color palettes by exporting them as independent palette files. These palette files can then be imported into any level of any scene and will become part of that level and scene. You can also link any level of any scene to an external palette. When you link a level to an external palette that palette gets copied into the level and the name of the palette will be displayed Level Properties dialog box. Every time you open a scene with levels that are linked to an external palette, the internal palettes get compared to the external palette. If the external palette has changed you will be asked whether to adopt the changes and maintain the link to the external palette or keep the internal palettes the way they are and break the link. This lets you change the colors in many scenes simply by changing one color palette.
The top left square in the palette controls the default line color. Changing the color in this square will change the color of all the lines in that level unless they have already been traced over with another color. The bottom right square controls the color of the screen in the Image Window.
To Export a Color Palette . . .
1. Right-Click (control+click on the Mac) on the label above the level.
2. Left-Click on the Export button in the Palette section of the dialog.
3. Select the location where you want to save the palette.
4. Give the palette a name.
5. Click on Save and then OK.
To Import a Color Palette . . .
1. Right-click (control+click on the Mac) on the label at the top of the level.
2. Left-Click on the Import button in the palette section of the dialog.
3. Select the palette you want to import.
4. Click Open and then OK.
To use an External color palette . . .
1.
Right-Click (control+click on the Mac) on the label above
the level you want to set.
2. Left-Click on the radio button labeled External.
3. Select the palette you want to use.
4. Click on Open and then OK.
Color models are painted images of characters that can be displayed while you are painting so you can pick your colors from the model rather than from the palette. This makes painting faster, easier and safer because painters are less likely to pick the wrong colors. However, painters can switch back and forth between the palette and the model as needed.
To create a color model, just scan and paint a drawing into the xsheet as you would normally and then click on File > Save As Model and give it a name. You can then delete it from the xsheet if you want.
To load a color model, right-click (control+click on the Mac) on the level header, click on Use Model and select the model you want. To use a model that has been loaded the View > Palette/Model option must be checked. To switch between the palette and the model, press the Shift key and click on the title bar.
To edit the current Model click on Edit > Model. The model will be loaded into the image window and the palette will appear. Save your changes by clicking on File > Save As Model.
AutoFill is found under the Actions menu and will automatically flood every highlighted frame in the selected level with the current color and then erase back from the corner of your choice to leave only what’s inside the lines painted.
This is the best way to start painting a character that is mostly the same color. It automatically paints all of Jupiter’s body, for example, leaving only the little stuff like his ears, nose, collar, etc.
It’s also great for doing ‘hidden line removal’. This makes it easier to see exactly what’s going on in the scene because you longer see through the foreground characters. It also gives you a ‘weighted’ pencil test so you can get a better idea of how much movement there is in the scene.
QuickErase
QuickErase lets you erase without changing tools. Just
right-click (control+click on the Mac) with the Fill tool and FlipBook will
erase the paint within the surrounding lines.
This really comes in handy with AutoFill. Sometimes there are areas that shouldn’t be painted even though they are enclosed by lines. AutoFill can’t know this but QuickErase makes it easy to erase those areas when you find them, without even changing tools.
In Color mode the Selection Tool disappears and you get a Fill Tool, Paintbrush, Eyedropper and Tracing Pen.
The Fill Tool works just like in other paint programs,
but FlipBook’s Fill Tool does much more.
Drag
n Fill
If you drag the Fill Tool the way you drag the Paint Brush it
will fill all of the areas it touches. We refer to this as a “Drag Fill”. This
is great for painting adjacent areas that are the same color. You just drag the
cursor across the areas to be painted and they all get painted.
Paint
By Numbers
If your character, or what ever you want to paint, stays pretty
much in the same place for several frames then you can paint those frames at
the same time. Just pick the color and position the cursor in the area you want
to fill and press a number key for the number of frames you want to be painted.
Auto
Gap Closure
Another powerful feature of FlipBook’s Fill Tool is the Automatic
Gap Closure. If there’s a gap in the line when you’re filling an area the paint
will leak out. FlipBook will actually find the gap, undo the fill that spilled
out, close the gap and then refill the area and all you have to do is press the
Escape key when there’s a spill.
Note: This only works with small gaps and it is possible that there could be other areas in the drawing where the lines are close enough to look like gaps and these ‘gaps’ could get closed too. But the lines won’t show up because they are transparent so all you have to do is fill inside the new area that got closed off and that’s easier than finding and closing the gaps yourself.
FlipBook also has a Leak Finder for when the gap is too big for the Automatic Gap Closure but still small enough to be hard to find that works when the Fill Tool Attributes dialog is open.
Drag the slider in the Fill Tool attributes dialog back to the left to a point just before the fill got out. Then hold the Alt key down and the Fill Tool will turn into a Pencil Tool with a 1-pixel diameter and a transparent color so you can easily close the gap.
AutoFinish
AutoFinish (F2) will paint all the remaining areas inside the
character with the nearest color. So you just have to paint the big areas and
as long as the nearest color to any empty area is the correct color, AutoFinish
will correctly fill in all of the remaining areas.
The Paint Brush lets you apply paint exactly where you
want it by brushing it on.
The Eyedropper picks colors from where ever you click in
the painted image while it is selected. Shift-Click will pick colors from the
background.
The Tracing Pen is used to change the color of lines that
were scanned or captured. It will not change anything but the color of the
lines so the lines remain exactly the way the animator drew them but can be any
color you want. You can use a large tip to go over the lines quickly lines or
use a small tip to get into tight corners.
You can add shadows to your animation by drawing shadow lines into the characters and painting one side of the line a little darker than the other and then tracing the line with either color to make it disappear.
If you Shift+Click with the Tracing Pen it will change all of the connected lines to the selected color.
FlipBook uses the
same keyboard shortcuts as Adobe Photoshop. These keyboard shortcuts are
displayed in the Tool menu for your convenience. Z= Zoom, H=Hand, E=Eraser,
B=Brush, I=Eyedropper, K=Fill, Y=Pencil, and we’re using T for Trace.
Boomerang lets you use Photoshop, or whatever your favorite image editing program is, to edit backgrounds, overlays and even cels when FlipBook is in color mode. Just highlight the thumbnail of the image you want to edit and click on the Boomerang icon. FlipBook will automatically launch your chosen editor and load the image. When you’re through editing the image close the editing window inside your graphics program and FlipBook will pop up again with the edits you made.
On the PC, the image editor is determined by the file associations that you set up in Windows. The Mac is set up to use Photoshop.
To set your image editor on a PC . . .
1.
Open My Computer.
2. Click on the Tools menu and select Folder Options.
3. Select the File Types tab.
4. Find BMP in the list of File Types.
5.
Click on the Advanced button at the bottom of the Folder
options dialog.
6. If “edit” is already in the list of Actions, select it and go to step 9.
7. If edit is not in the list of Actions click on the “New” button on the right to bring up the New Action dialog.
8. Type “edit” into the Action box and select it.
9. Click on Browse to select your favorite image editing program to when editing those files.
10. Click on OK to close each dialog.
11. Repeat steps 4 through 9 for TGA files too.
Note: When you use the boomerang feature to edit cels in another image editor they will be converted to overlays and can no longer be edited in FlipBook and will not respond to palette changes in FlipBook.
As in traditional animation, FlipBook Pro uses tone mattes to add shadows, highlights, glows and other lighting effects to the animation. Tone mattes are additional layers of images that contain areas of partially transparent color that when added to the image, create shadows, highlights, glows etc.
These tone mattes
can be blurred either inward or outward for soft, natural-looking edges. The
transparency of the tone matte comes from the colors themselves and should be
set in the color palette.
In FlipBook you can have up to five layers of tone mattes behind or ‘Below’ the character and five more ‘Above’ or in front. The layers can also be renamed to make it easier to keep track of your tone mattes.
For many effects like rim lights or simple shadows or highlights you can use tone mattes that are automatically derived from the character itself instead of having to draw the tone mattes. Just blur the tone matte inward and you get a rim light.
These tone mattes can then be shifted up, down, left or right and cropped to only appear within the character to create a shadow or highlight on the edge of the character.
There are two new tools designed specifically for tone mattes. These tools have a P in their icon in the tool box and their cursor so you know when you are using them. We use a P because they only add tone mattes where there is already Paint.
The PBrush will only add paint to the tone matte where there is paint in the original character. Blur this tone matte outward and it is perfect for tracing over ordinary swords to turn them into Jedi light sabers.
The PFill tool creates a tone matte either inside or outside the painted area of the character. If you click inside a painted area of the character the PFill tool will create a tone matte wherever there is paint in the character. Clicking outside the painted area will create a tone matte that is restricted to the area outside of the painted character.
To create a rim light or a backlight, use the PFill tool to make a tone matte with a dark color that is partially transparent in a layer above the character and blur it inward leaving the edges lighter than the middle. To create a glow, use a layer behind the character and blur outward with a bright color that is partially transparent.
Once you have created the tone matte(s) for at least one frame then you can go into the layer dialog and set the offset, the blur and the compositing values to get the effect you want. Those values will be used for the entire level.
FlipBook Pro also provides a feature called AutoMatte. This Action will automatically create tone mattes in the selected layer of all the highlighted drawings wherever there is already any paint. So all you have to do is set the blur and offset amounts for the tone mattes once and the whole level is done.
When you want complete control over the shadows and highlights you can draw them by hand and then scan and paint them in FlipBook.
To scan and paint hand-drawn tone mattes . . .
1. Select the square in the xsheet where you want to start scanning in your tone mattes.
2. Select the layer you want the tone matte to go into.
3. Scan.
When you first open a drawing that contains a tone matte, the scanned outline of the tone matte will be displayed in black, just like normal pencil lines. But when you use the PFill tool to paint inside the outline with the desired color, FlipBook automatically converts the outline to the same color as the fill, saving you from having to do it yourself.
FlipBook also has a special version of the AutoFill action to speed up painting tone mattes. This will fill all of the enclosed areas with the selected color of paint and then convert black pencil the line to the same color.
WARNING! Do not use the AutoFill function on drawings that already have the black line converted to color. Without the black line FlipBook will erase the tone mattes and you will need to import and paint them again.
Camera Moves let you Pan, Zoom, Rotate, Blur and Fade Out your animation across time with a variable ease-in and ease-out to smooth out the starts and stops. You can also pan along a curved path when you set 3 or more key frames.
Creating camera moves in FlipBook is very easy. You just compose the ‘key frames’ using the Camera dialog to position your images in the Image Window and FlipBook will calculate all of the in-between positions for the rest of the frames.
Click on the Camera Move icon to bring up the Camera dialog.
Peg Bars
FlipBook simulates a traditional animation camera using ‘virtual’ peg bars that work like their actual counterparts to maintain registration and move images together. Initially each level in the xsheet is attached to its own peg bar. This lets you move the background and any foreground level(s) independently. To move several levels together you can either attach them to the same peg bar or you can group multiple peg bars together.
FlipBook has two types of groups. The first group is the Camera Group. This affects everything. You can pan, zoom, rotate, blur, and fade everything that is under the camera.
The other groups are for peg bars down below the camera. Initially all of the peg bars are attached to the Table Top group. This group lets you move everything together to compose the frame. However, you can also re-assign each peg bar to a different group to move several peg bars together without moving all of the others. When moving groups each peg bar maintains its own individual movement while moving with the group.
For example, you could have a city street on the BG peg bar, a car going east on a second peg bar, and another car going west on a third peg bar. By grouping all of these peg bars you can move the group to pan down the street without interrupting the relative movement of the cars. You can also pan the camera to move to multiple groups.
To attach a level from the xsheet to a peg bar . . .
1. Right-click (control+click on the Mac) on the level header in the xsheet.
2. Select the desired peg from the drop-down list in the dialog.
3. Click on OK.
4. To rename a peg bar or re-assign a peg bar to a different group …
5. In the Camera dialog, select the peg bar you want to change.
6. Click on the Change button next to the peg bar.
7. Select the Group that you want the peg bar to be in and type in the name you want to use.
8. Click on OK.
Note: You can also rename Groups in the same way.
When you scale or rotate a peg bar or a group (other than the camera group) you may want to select the center point around which the scaling and rotating take place.
To set a peg or group center . . .
1. Select the peg or the group in the Camera dialog.
2. Click on the Peg Center Button.
3. Click on the point in the image that you want to be the center point.
If you have already entered any zoom or rotation values, your image may shift to reflect the changes as the new peg center is applied.
Key Frames are frames you compose to control what happens in the scene. They’re identified by a red triangle in the upper left corner of the thumbnail in the xsheet. The camera will automatically calculate the path from one key frame to the next to pan, zoom, rotate etc. The speed of the move is controlled by the number of frames between the key frames. Any frame can be a key frame for one or more types of camera moves.
Example: Frame 1 can be a key frame for both a pan and a zoom. And the pan can end on frame 48 while the zoom continues to frame 72.
Key frames are set by clicking on any of the camera move parameters such as N. S, E, W, Zoom etc. You can tell which frames are Key Frames because the edit box that holds the value for the Key Frame will be white (enabled) rather than grayed out. To move from one key frame to the next use the Prev Key and the Next Key buttons.
The Clear Key button will clear the currently select key frame. Control + Clear Key clears all the keys for that parameter for the current peg or group. The Clear All Keys button clears all key frames for all parameters.
If you want to hold a certain camera position throughout the scene just compose one key frame anywhere in the scene and the entire scene will hold that position from start to finish.
The first thing to remember when doing camera moves is that the instructions are described using North, South, East and West and refer to the movement of the camera, not the artwork. To see the top part of an image you would move the camera NORTH.
When you do camera moves, you must set and compose a key frame at the beginning and end of each camera move, or each segment of a camera move. You compose each of the key frames and FlipBook will calculate the position of the peg bars and images in the rest of the frames.
Pans and camera zooms are usually measured in fields. A field is an animator’s measurement that refers to an area of the drawing. For television, and most everything else except film, the standard size is a 12-field image. From there the fields reduce in size in concentric rectangles. Animators usually draw using a 12-field guide that is 12 inches wide. Since television has a 4:3 aspect ratio the height should be 9 inches. An 8-field image would be 8 inches wide and 6 inches high.
1. Click on the Camera Move icon to bring up the Camera dialog.
2. Use the DVD controls, or the Goto button, to go to the frame 1. (This could also be any other frame where you want to start Zooming.)
3. Select the Camera Group.
4. Click on the Zoom button to create the initial key frame for the zoom.
5. Use the DVD controls or the Goto button to go the last frame in the scene (or any frame where you want the zoom to end.)
6. Click on the Zoom button to create the ending key frame for the zoom.
7. Drag the cursor in the image window to adjust the image size OR enter a field size of 8 in the Zoom edit box and click on Apply
8. Click on Play to see the scene play with the Zoom.
You can also add a Pan to the Zoom. This will start full frame, centered and then zoom in on the West, or left, side of the scene.
1. Use the DVD controls, or the Goto button, to go back to frame 1.
2. Click on the W button to create the initial key frame for the East-West movement.
3. Use the DVD controls or the Goto button to go back to the last frame in the scene (or the frame where you want the zoom to end.)
4. Click on the W button and drag the image to the right but stop before you run out of image on the left hand side of the screen.
Now you should see the camera zoom in on the scene and pan to the left to keep what’s on the WEST side of the image on screen.
The way the increments are measured may vary, but all camera moves work the same way and follow the same steps. Pans are measured in fields. Rotation is measured in degrees. Opacity is measured in percent. Blur is measured by the size of the area you want to average in order to soften the picture and the options are from 1 to 20. Blur can only be seen in Broadcast quality mode. This is set under Options > Settings.
When you want the camera to move straight from one point to the next you may want to include an ease-in and/or an ease-out. An ease-in causes a peg, and the images on it, to gradually pick up speed as the peg eases into motion. An ease-out makes the peg slow down and gradually come to a stop. The ease-in and ease-out are controlled by setting the number of frames you want to spend speeding up or slowing down. Any frames in between the ease-in and ease-out will move at a constant rate.
To set an ease-in and/or and ease-out…
1. Select the key frame where you want to set the ease-in or out.
2. Select the parameter (Zoom, Rotate, etc.) that you want the ease-in or out to apply to.
3. Click on Key Options and enter the number of frames you want.
FlipBook can also do curved path camera moves. For curved path camera moves you must set at least 3 key frames and then FlipBook will plot the smoothest path that runs through all the key frames that you create including an automatic ease-in and ease-out. Use the Key Options button to set the intermediate key frames as Curved Path. The first and last key frames in a scene do not need to be set as being curved.
FlipBook has two compositing modes. In the automatic compositing mode FlipBook will automatically composite all of the affected frames every time you make a change. This compositing happens as a background task while you continue to do what you want. If you turn auto compositing off (Options > Auto Composite) then FlipBook will wait to composite until you turn auto compositing back on.
FlipBook can composite and play your scenes with varying degrees of quality for even faster processing. Preview 1 (under the View menu) composites every pixel but does not do sub-pixel calculations, which is what makes it faster than Broadcast mode. Preview 2, 3 and 4 composite every 2nd, 3rd or 4th pixel respectively. If you select Preview/Broadcast under Options > Settings (FlipBook > Preferences on the Mac) your final output movie files will always be in broadcast quality.
DigiCel FlipBook stores all of the drawings in its own compressed format. This saves time loading the files and space on your hard drive. When you want to get image data out of FlipBook you use the Export option.
You can export still images, alone or in a sequence, and you can export movies. And in either case you have complete control over which levels and which frames are to be included in the export. You can also control the file name that the exported files will be given.
Movies can be exported as either AVI, QuickTime or GIF files. GIF files are very small because they can only have 256 colors. They are great for sending in emails or posting on the internet. AVI and QuickTime files take up more space on your hard drive but they can be broadcast quality output. The Export Movie dialog also includes the settings that control the name, location, frame rate, size and compression format of the movie file.
To Export a movie . . .
1. Highlight the area in the xsheet that you want to include in the movie. Clicking in the top left corner of the xsheet it will highlight the entire scene.
2. Click on the File menu and select Export > Movie.
3. Select AVI, MOV or GIF as desired.
4. Check the Include Sound box to include the soundtrack in the movie file.
5. Set the size for the movie file.
6. Set the codec as desired.
7. Check or set the Frame Rate.
8. Click on Create.
9. Approve the name and location for the movie file in the Export dialog.
Note: Codec is an abbreviated name for Compressor/Decompressor. This is used to make the movie file smaller but it will also have an effect on the image quality.
Exporting GIF files is just like exporting AVI or QuickTime movie files. But you don’t need to select a codec and you can choose between 16 and 256 shades of gray. At the time of this printing FlipBook only does B&W GIFs. (Not available on the Mac.)
If you have the Telecine option FlipBook can convert animation drawn at 24 fps to 30 fps for NTSC TV. Just set the frame rate to 30 fps and select Odd or Even to match the field sequence to your output card.
On a PC you can export still images as either BMP or TGA files. All Windows programs read and write BMP files and all major video programs support TGA files. For exporting images that include the background you should use the Composited Frames option and either BMP or TGA will work fine.
If you don’t want to include the BG in the exported image then must choose either Individual Cels or Combined Cels and use the TGA 32 option. FlipBook will include the alpha channel in the exported files.
Additional formats like PNG, TIF and PICT are available on the Mac.
To export each drawing individually at its full resolution without including any of FlipBook’s camera moves select the Individual Cels option in the Export dialog. The images will be named with an L and an F in their name to identify their Level and their Frame, example: L002F005.TGA.
Choose Combined Cels if you want to combine several levels together into a single file for each frame at its full resolution without including any of FlipBook’s camera moves. These files will be numbered sequentially with a “Frm” prefix, example: Frm0005.TGA. Or you can specify your own prefix.
Either of these two methods is good for exporting images that you want to import into program like Adobe After Effects.
Choose Composited Frames to export 1 file per frame at the scene resolution and to camera moves. These files will be numbered sequentially with a “Frm” prefix, example: Frm0005.TGA. Or you can give the files a different prefix if you prefer.
To export files . . .
1. Select the range of cels in the xsheet that you want to export.
2. Click on File > Export.
3. Select Individual Cels, Combined Cels or Composited Frames.
4. Select BMP, TGA24 or TGA32.
5. Click on OK.
Select the folder you want to put the files in and click on Open.
You can print the image exactly as it appears in the Image Window. The Print command is under the File menu and can also be invoked with the standard keyboard shortcut.
If you can't find the answers to your questions please email
us at techsupt@digicel.net or call us Monday - Friday 9AM-5PM Arizona time so we can help.
Version 5.0
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All Rights Reserved
DigiCel, Inc.
14560 W. Windward Ave. Goodyear, AZ 85338
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