๐ฆ๐บ๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ ๐ ๐ฎ๐ด๐ป๐ฒ๐ ๐ฅ๐ถ๐ด๐ are a unique blend of the two existing approaches in the digital cutout world:
free-floating, unconstrained elements and bone-based skeletal systems.
Flash animation has gained a lot of its popularity due to the former. The ease of manipulations and the lack of constraints allows for very quick and easy posing, squash & stretch and is technically very user-friendly, due to the relatively easy setup. The disadvantage of this approach is that it requires a lot of clicking, manual selections and constant guesswork about the exact positions of joints. The early enthusiasm of users, who could start having fun almost immediately quickly turns into frustration due to poor ergonomics and precision.
Bone-based skeletal systems, on the other hand, provide hierarchical structure to the rigs, which allows easy chain selection, requires no guesswork about exact position of joints, but also limits movement of elements and imposes some form of skeletal rigidity.
Even well-implemented bone systems such as the one in Moho seem to impact the artistic output in a less than favorable way.
Smart Magnet Rigs provide all the benefits of the two approaches, eliminating the negative side effects completely.
With Smart Magnet Rigs animators are free to enjoy the unrestrained approach for as long as they want, whenever they want, while at the same time a non-intrusive flexible virtual hierarchy allows them to chain-select, set Transformation points at joints automatically, or pose a bunch of symbols as a skeleton on-the-fly with high-precision FK and IK tools.
Both approaches complement one another, removing all frustration with the deficiencies of either and making the process of animating much more enjoyable, faster, more productive and creatively more fulfilling.
๐ฅ Smart Magnet Rigs - Where to start?
free-floating, unconstrained elements and bone-based skeletal systems.
Flash animation has gained a lot of its popularity due to the former. The ease of manipulations and the lack of constraints allows for very quick and easy posing, squash & stretch and is technically very user-friendly, due to the relatively easy setup. The disadvantage of this approach is that it requires a lot of clicking, manual selections and constant guesswork about the exact positions of joints. The early enthusiasm of users, who could start having fun almost immediately quickly turns into frustration due to poor ergonomics and precision.
Bone-based skeletal systems, on the other hand, provide hierarchical structure to the rigs, which allows easy chain selection, requires no guesswork about exact position of joints, but also limits movement of elements and imposes some form of skeletal rigidity.
Even well-implemented bone systems such as the one in Moho seem to impact the artistic output in a less than favorable way.
Smart Magnet Rigs provide all the benefits of the two approaches, eliminating the negative side effects completely.
With Smart Magnet Rigs animators are free to enjoy the unrestrained approach for as long as they want, whenever they want, while at the same time a non-intrusive flexible virtual hierarchy allows them to chain-select, set Transformation points at joints automatically, or pose a bunch of symbols as a skeleton on-the-fly with high-precision FK and IK tools.
Both approaches complement one another, removing all frustration with the deficiencies of either and making the process of animating much more enjoyable, faster, more productive and creatively more fulfilling.
๐ฅ Smart Magnet Rigs - Where to start?
Rigging Characters with Outlines
The question how to rig characters with outlines has popped up multiple times.
This is an indicator that there is a lot of interest in the topic and not enough information available from other sources.
At times there were even some voices suggesting that, because our sample rigs donโt have outlines, SMR as a system cannot be used to design and animate characters with outlines.
This should be enough to justify the existence of a short dedicated article.
In the world of digital cutouts outlines make life more difficult and complicate everything. This is why a large part of the character designs (and rigs) donโt have any outlines at all, or only have partial in the facial area, hands, feet and some wrinkles here and there.
Ultimately, it is an artistic and stylistic choice.
Read more...
The question how to rig characters with outlines has popped up multiple times.
This is an indicator that there is a lot of interest in the topic and not enough information available from other sources.
At times there were even some voices suggesting that, because our sample rigs donโt have outlines, SMR as a system cannot be used to design and animate characters with outlines.
This should be enough to justify the existence of a short dedicated article.
In the world of digital cutouts outlines make life more difficult and complicate everything. This is why a large part of the character designs (and rigs) donโt have any outlines at all, or only have partial in the facial area, hands, feet and some wrinkles here and there.
Ultimately, it is an artistic and stylistic choice.
Read more...
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๐ฅ Smart Magnet Rigs make life EXCITING! ๐ฅ
๐ Advanced color management with Symbol Palette Control
Symbol Palette Control is an interactive panel which allows users to create multiple color palettes associated with a Symbol and then switch between these palettes.
Color palettes can be copied (cloned), modified with color effects, reorganized, saved as files or loaded from a saved file.
Palettes can also be optimized, by unifying the color of similar swatches, thus reducing the overall number of colors.
Color swatches can be modified individually, grouped, regrouped or excluded from color swapping.
Read more...
Symbol Palette Control is an interactive panel which allows users to create multiple color palettes associated with a Symbol and then switch between these palettes.
Color palettes can be copied (cloned), modified with color effects, reorganized, saved as files or loaded from a saved file.
Palettes can also be optimized, by unifying the color of similar swatches, thus reducing the overall number of colors.
Color swatches can be modified individually, grouped, regrouped or excluded from color swapping.
Read more...
Element Welder covers all situations where Soft Rotation with KineFlex is undesirable.
๐ฅ๐ฌ๐ฅ Watch on YouTube...
๐ฅ๐ฌ๐ฅ Watch on YouTube...
Rigging longer skirts
The traditional Flash approach to animating a longer skirt would be to nest its animation inside a Graphic Symbol, and run this symbol in sync with the character timeline, matching each keyframe of the character animation with an internal keyframe. Usually the skirt would be shape tweened inside the symbol. Each keyframe should match the positions of the thighs at character level.
Smart Magnet Rigs, however, are so flexible that they provide an effective alternative.
A simple setup of four elements allows dynamic and interactive posing, where the skirt is mostly animated at character level, and the body poses are automatically matched.
Read more...
The traditional Flash approach to animating a longer skirt would be to nest its animation inside a Graphic Symbol, and run this symbol in sync with the character timeline, matching each keyframe of the character animation with an internal keyframe. Usually the skirt would be shape tweened inside the symbol. Each keyframe should match the positions of the thighs at character level.
Smart Magnet Rigs, however, are so flexible that they provide an effective alternative.
A simple setup of four elements allows dynamic and interactive posing, where the skirt is mostly animated at character level, and the body poses are automatically matched.
Read more...