User's Guide & Tutorial

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 use pencil and paper or draw right on the computer, 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 & Tutorial 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.

Installation

Installing DigiCel FlipBook is just as easy as using it. Just follow the instructions on the screen.

PC

To install FlipBook on a PC...

1.        Put the FlipBook CD in your CD-ROM drive.

2.       If it doesn’t start by itself open My Computer.

3.       Double-Click on the CD-ROM drive in the My Computer window.

4.       Double-Click on the Setup icon.

5.       Click on Next to start the installation and follow the prompts.

6.       Click on Exit, when prompted, to complete the installation.

Mac

To install FlipBook on a Mac…

1.        Drag the Flipbook application icon into your Applications folder.

2.       You may also drop the icon directly onto the alias provided next to FlipBook for convenience.

3.       Once the application has copied, you can safely unmount the disk image or CD.

Registration

If you have a DigiCel Portable License Key you don’t need to register. Just plug it into a USB port before you start FlipBook and you’re ready to go.

FlipBook is delivered in demo mode. All of the features are enabled but there is a watermark in the images you create. When you register your copy of FlipBook you will get a code that will unlock the features you ordered and let you create scenes without the watermark. After that you will be able to download free updates without having to register again. If you order more features, we just send you a new code to turn on the new features. You can update your registration FlipBook from the Help Menu.

To register FlipBook…

1.        Start FlipBook to bring up the Registration dialog.

2.       Click on Register Now, or if you’re already in FlipBook, click on Help > Register.

3.       Email the Registration ID along with your name and order number to register@digicel.net.

4.       When you receive the Registration Code, enter it into the Registration Code box along with your name and click OK.

Introduction

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.

To start FlipBook on a PC Click on Start > Programs > FlipBook.

On a Mac click on Go > Applications and double-click on FlipBook.

This will bring up FlipBook’s Start-Up Dialog. Select Open Existing Scene and double-click on the Demo file.

Image Window

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 options that you will use frequently in FlipBook. In the Mac version you can select which icons you want to use. This will be added to the next release of the Windows version.

Here is a brief description of the common icons. New, Open, Save, Cut, Copy, Paste, Undo, Redo, Print.

This icon is for enabling the Light Box or the `Stack' of drawings. In B&W mode when the `Stack' is on FlipBook keeps track of up to 10 drawings on your light table and can simulate traditional page flipping. You can Flip forward or backward through the drawings on the Stack by pressing the Enter or Backspace keys while the Image Window is active or the by pressing the Shift Key and dragging the cursor back and forth in the Image Window. Disabling the Stack clears the list of images.

This icon is the Light for the `Light Table'. When the Light is on you can see all of the images that are currently on the Stack in the Image Window. The Light only works when the Stack is on.

This icon controls whether or not the background image (BG) will be displayed in the image window during editing. The BG level is never transparent so the Light Table features will not work with the BG.

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.

This icon switches you back and forth between viewing thumbnail images in the xsheet or just their labels.

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.

The Color icon lets you switch between the Color mode and B&W 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 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 to your scenes.

The Boomerang icon passes images to and from FlipBook to your favorite graphics editing program so you can edit them there.

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 Special FX, which is part of 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 the 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 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 in the status bar at the bottom of the Image Window.

To the right of the DVD controls there is a Slider. This lets you drag the pointer to move forward and backward through the scene and set start and stop points for playback.

Exposure Sheet (Xsheet)

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 is on the right.

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 keys.

Number of Levels

One of the features that will vary between the different versions of FlipBook is the number of levels you can have in the xsheet. FlipBook Lite has 2 levels, a background and a foreground. FlipBook and the optional Paint and Camera modules have 6 levels, including the background. FlipBook Pro can have up to 100 levels.

Enable or Disable Levels

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 instantly re-composite the preview and update the Image Window to reflect your changes.

Level and Cel Labels

As a 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 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. In the capture, scan and import dialogs there is another Label edit box where you can enter 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. And you can rename any cel by right-clicking on it.

Thumbnails

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.

Backgrounds

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.

Frames and Timing

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. This can be set in the Settings dialog under the Options menu. You can also temporarily change the rate during playback by pressing the + and – keys on the keyboard while the Image Window is active.

The other way 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 make it easy to see 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 Blank Cel command (Ctrl+B) is under the Edit menu and blank cels are identified in the xsheet with an X whenever thumbnails are on.

Creating a New Scene

To create a new scene, click on the New Scene icon or 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 set or changed anytime.

Set the Frame Size

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 in the New dialog, select the Custom setting 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.

Non-Square Pixel Formats

Both PAL and NTSC formats actually allow more than one frame size. PAL is usually 768 X 576 or 720 X 576. NTSC is usually 640 X 480 or 720 X 480. The hardware you use to output your animation for TV will determine which size you should use.

Both of the ‘720’ formats use non-square pixels to make up the image. Computers generally work with square pixels. The easiest 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 as the frame size and then during the Export step FlipBook can scale the output down to 720 X 480. For PAL you should use 768 X 576 as the screen size and then during the Export step FlipBook can scale it to 720 X 576. This let’s you work with the correct aspect ratio on the computer and then delivers the correct aspect ratio for broadcast on TV.

Playback Rate

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 long 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.

Number of Frames

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: Longer scenes require more RAM in your computer to play back smoothly.

Number of Levels

FlipBook Lite has 2 levels, a foreground and a background. FlipBook 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 > Add a Level. You cannot delete levels but as long as there’s nothing in them they don’t affect performance so there’s no need to delete them.

OverScan

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.

Camera Capture

Shooting your 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. Stop motion animation should be shot into the background level. Images captured into the foreground levels are saved as gray scale with the white part becoming transparent.

To Capture drawings with a camera…

1.        Highlight the square in the xsheet where you want to start shooting.

2.       Click on the Camera icon  to open the Capture dialog.

3.       Put each drawing on the peg bar.

4.       Click on Capture.

Once you’ve captured the first image, you can also press the enter key or the space bar to capture images using the preset Hold or use 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. With a reasonably modern computer the compositing will stay ahead of the playing and you won’t have to wait for anything.

Shooting Tips

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.

Camera Settings

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 and Focus the Camera

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 if possible while focusing.

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.

Adjust the Exposure (Aperture)

Make the image a bright as you can without making the pencil lines fade out or disappear.

Capture Card or Device Settings

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 Capture  icon to open the Video Capture dialog and gain access to these settings.

Note: The related settings on the Mac are accessed through the Options button.

Device Menu

You will see your capture device(s) listed under the Device Menu.

Options Menu

The items on the Options menu are determined by the camera manufacturer and vary widely. Here are the most common options.

Source

This lets you select which input your camera is hooked up to such as composite (RCA) and S-VHS.

Format

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.

Brightness

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.

Contrast

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.

Saturation

This is a color setting. For pencil drawings it is best to set the saturation to zero if you can.

Digital Video Size

This controls the image size for digital video cameras.

Settings Menu

Rotate Image 180 Degrees

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.

Hold Aspect Ratio

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.

Pinnacle Workaround or Halt Streams for Dialog

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 on the Pinnacle Workaround to halt the video stream in order to be able to change the frame size. Then you will have to turn the workaround off to change the other settings.

FlipBook Capture Settings

FlipBook provides several additional ways to help you improve the quality of the images you capture under a camera.

Image Processing

When the image processing is turned off you see exactly what is coming through the camera including whatever changes you made with the manufacturer’s contrast and brightness settings.

When Image Processing is on FlipBook will show you what the image will look like after it has been processed according to the white threshold and gamma settings.

White Threshold

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.

Gamma

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.

Frame. Level, Hold, Label

This area lets you control where the next image will be positioned in the xsheet and what it will be named.

Live Image Overlay

FlipBook can display the live image coming from the camera over a previously captured image or switch back and forth between the live and the previous image. This is very important for realigning the camera and the artwork if one of them has been moved. The Alternate Lines option is great for getting the realignment close. Toggling back and forth between Live and Previous (F7) can help you get it perfect.

Stop Motion    

FlipBook also has several features designed especially to help you do stop motion animation too. Enabling the Xsheet Cursors and the WV Option lets you use the cursor keys to step back and forth through the frames that have already been captured and when you return to an 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. And of course, as soon as you exit the Capture dialog you can play what you’ve shot instantly.

You can also switch between the previous image and the live image or see both at the same time while you’re adjusting the tripod to line things up.

Note: For color movies, be sure to capture into the background level with the color mode on.

Instant Gratification

You can capture images directly into any highlighted location in the xsheet by pressing the F8 key. Then you can immediately play all or part of the scene including the newest frame or even step through the last few frames using the cursor keys.

Double Exposure

The Alternate Lines option lets you see the live image from the camera and the previous frame at the same time.

Toggle Preview

While the Video Capture dialog is open the F7 key will toggle back and forth instantly between the live image and the previous image to let you see how the movement looks.

Scanning

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 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.

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.  Color drawings only need to be scanned at about 75 dpi but make sure the Scale to Fit option is turned on unless you want your BGs and overlays to be bigger than your cels.

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.

AutoScan

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.

OverScan

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 need to create higher resolution images to begin with.

The OverScan feature lets you start off with more information (higher resolution images) and then 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, accurate 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.

Auto Hold

This option meant for replacing rough drawings with cleaned-up drawings. It automatically places the scanned images into cel locations that already have images in them so you don’t have to adjust the timing again when you replace the roughs with the clean-ups.

Scanning Tips

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

Cels

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.

Black & White

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.

Gray Scale

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

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.

Overlays

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.

Image Size and Aspect Ratio

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 it doesn’t matter because 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.

Scanning Resolution

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.

720 X 480 Output Size

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.

640 X 480 Output Size

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.

Brightness

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.

Peg Bar

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.

Drawing

The first thing to cover when talking about drawing on a computer is what you're going to use to draw. DigiCel 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. DigiCel recommends Wacom Tablets, which start at $99.

In Pencil 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.

Tools

The Tool Box holds all of your editing tools. Right-click or hold the cursor down on any tool to see its attributes.

The Pencil is for drawing 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 the 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.

Tool Attributes

Some tools have attributes that you can control. You can access the tool attributes by right-clicking 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.

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.

Selecting Drawings in the XSheet

Left-click in the xsheet to select the 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 it will change so you can see what has been selected.

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 when you save your changes. The thumbnails will also show the colors that have been painted making it easy to see how much has been done and how much 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.

Light Table

Some animators and most in-betweeners use a light table because the light coming from behind helps them to see through the drawing they are working on to other drawings below for reference.  For example, when they're working on drawing number 7 they may place number 6 and number 8 beneath number 7 on their light table. Then they draw lines in-between the lines of the previous and the next drawing. That's where in-betweening and in-betweeners get their names.

FlipBook’s Light Table allows you to see up to 10 drawings at the same time stacked up one on top of the other. FlipBook will still keep track of the drawings that are the stack while the Light is turned off.

You can turn the 'Stack' on and off by clicking on the stack icon. If the 'Stack' is turned on when you open a drawing, that drawing the will be placed on top of any other drawings that might be on the Light Table in the Image Window.  The drawing on the top of the Stack will have a green background in the xsheet the other drawings below the open drawing on the stack will have a yellow background. To remove a drawing from the Stack Alt+click on it's thumbnail in the xsheet. If you click on the 'Stack' icon to turn off the Stack it will remove all of the other drawings from the Light Table except the top one.

In the "Settings" dialog under the "Options" menu, you can adjust the Light Table Settings. For example:

Stack Max. Depth = 10 (this controls the number drawings that can be stacked and must be between 1 and 10)

Stack Min. Density = 10 (this controls the brightness of your Light)

Make sure that both your Stack and Light options are "On".

Clicking on the Light icon turns the light on and off to display or hide all of images on the 'Stack'. The open image, which is on the top of the 'Stack', can always be seen whether the light is on or not.

NOTE: The light table features do not work in the background level or in color mode. They are only for drawing with the pencil or painting multi-level animation.

Cut, Copy and Paste Partial Images

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.

8.       Click outside the bounding box to apply it.

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, Ctrl+H, 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 Ctrl+H repeatedly.

Flip or Roll

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 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. FlipBook handles 10 sheets and lets you control the Flipping or Rolling from the keyboard or with the cursor.

The Enter key will Flip forward and the Backspace key Flips backward. If the Stack is on, only the drawings on the Stack will be flipped. If the Stack 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.

Scrubbing through the Stack

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 stack. This only plays the drawings that are on the stack without any compositing.

Scrubbing through the Scene

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 Play 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 stack and the scene does not work when the pencil is set to draw rectangles or ellipses because those features use the shift and control keys.

Undo

You can Undo  and Redo  up to 20 sequential edits to the drawing by clicking on the appropriate icons.

Rotoscoping

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 an Movie into the background.

2.       Display the background (BG).

3.       Turn off the Stack  icon.

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.

Importing

FlipBook lets you import both movies and still images. Images imported into the background level will retain their natural characteristics. In the foreground, black & white or gray scale images will come in as line art. Color images with the appropriate 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.

Note: FlipBook PT is a pencil test program and doesn't do color. You may import color files but they will be displayed to gray scale.

1.        Highlight the first square in which you want the imported file(s) to go.

2.       Click on File > Import.

3.       Select Stills or AVI.

Stills

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.

 Movies

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.

Playing

FlipBook lets you play your animation forward or backward 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 or scrub through the scene for complete control.

Playback Controls

You can play your scene anytime by clicking on the PLAY button in the DVD style control panel. 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.

Just before the Goto button are up and down arrows to 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.

Note: As a general rule, to keep your scenes playing smoothly, you should have at least 1 megabyte of RAM for every frame in your scene.

Slider

The Slider control, to the right of the Goto button 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.

Editing the Xsheet

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 edit while the scene is playing and see your changes immediately.

There are two kinds of editing. One actually 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.

Drag and Drop

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.

Cut, Copy and Paste

There are also 3 ways to Cut, Copy and Paste. You can use the Edit menu, the Icons 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 the 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, they 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. 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 & Deleting Entire Frames

Inserting and Deleting Frames not only affects the images, if there are any, but also the frames (timing) as well. If you highlight three frames and delete them, the drawings down below in the xsheet will move up 3 frames. If you highlight 3 frames and then insert, the drawings in those 3 frames and all the drawings below them will move down 3 frames.

There are 3 ways to Insert or Delete Entire Frames. You can use the Edit menu, the Insert and Delete keys on the keyboard or you can right-click on any frame number and select Insert or Delete from the pop-up dialog box. This last option also lets you specify how many frames you want to Insert or Delete at the current location.

To Delete and entire frame...

1.        Highlight the range that you want to delete by clicking and dragging the cursor in the xsheet.

2.       Press the Delete key.

To insert an entire frame...

3.       Highlight the area where you want the new blank squares to be by clicking and dragging the cursor in the xsheet.

4.       Press the Insert key.

The rest of the frames down below will move up or down accordingly.

Adding More Frames

To add more frames to the end of the scene, right-click on any frame number, enter the number of frames you want to add and then click on the Append button.

Adding More Levels

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 & Deleting Within Levels

Inserting and Deleting within multiple levels lets you change the timing in those levels without affecting the rest of the levels in the scene. Since this is a frequent requirement FlipBook provides 4 different ways to do it. Two of these ways, using the Edit menu or the Insert and Delete keys, are just like inserting and deleting frames except you only highlight the squares within the levels where you want to Insert or Delete. The other 2 ways are a bit different so we'll cover them separately.

If you still want to Insert or Delete within multiple levels but you prefer to use the mouse you can do that too. We refer to this method 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 with the mouse...

1.        Click, drag and let go to highlight 1 or more drawings in the same row.

2.       Hold the Alt Key down.

3.       Click and Drag the drawings up or down.

The rest of the drawings below the one you drag 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 1 level you can use the number keys to set the number of frames during 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.

To change the timing of a drawing using the numeric keys...

1.        Make sure that none of the drawings you want to change are open (green highlight) or on the stack (yellow highlight).

2.       Highlight only the first drawing whose timing you want to change.

3.       Press the number key for the number of frames for which you want that drawing to be displayed.

Note: The above method only works for adding up to 9 frames between drawings. If you want to add between 10 and 99 frames between drawing hold the control key down and FlipBook will wait for two numbers to be pressed before adjusting the timing to the next drawing.

Soundtracks

DigiCel FlipBook makes it easy to import and synchronize your soundtracks to your animation.

You can drag and drop a WAV file onto the xsheet to import it and then you can sync it to the animation by dragging it up or down while holding down the Control Key, (Apple key on a Mac) even while the sound is playing.

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 also import a soundtrack from the Sound Properties dialog.

To import a soundtrack...

1.        Click the Sound icon to display the sound column in the xsheet if necessary.

2.       Click on File > Import > Sound or Right-Click at the top of the Sound column.

3.       Click to put a check in the Enable Sound box.

4.       Click on Set to select a sound file

5.       Click OK.

To synchronize the soundtrack...

1.        Click in the Sound level.

2.       Hold down the Alt Key.

3.       Drag the soundtrack up or down as desired.

You can turn the sound on and off by double-clicking on the Sound label at the top of the level.

Printing

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 Control+P keyboard shortcut.

Compositing

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.

Exporting

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

Movies can be exported as either AVI (QuickTime on the Mac) 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. Movie files take up more space on your hard drive but they can be broadcast quality output. The Export AVI (Movie on the Mac) dialog also includes the settings that control the name, location, frame rate, size and compression format of the movie file as well as the player you would like to use to view the movie.

AVI (Movie on the Mac)

To Export a movie ...

1.        Highlight the area in the xsheet that you want to include in the movie.

2.       Click on the File menu and select Export.

3.       Check the Include Sound box to include the soundtrack in the movie file.

4.       Set the size for the movie file.

5.       Set the codec as desired.

6.       Click on Create.

7.       Approve the name and location for the movie file in the Export dialog.

Note: Codec is an abbreviated name for Compressor/Decompressor. Windows provides several standard codecs and others are also available. If you don't already have a preferred codec, Mpeg 4 is a good one that makes relatively small files.

Once you have exported your movie you can play the file with any standard player.

To play a movie you've already Exported...

1.        Click on the File menu and then select Export.

2.       If necessary, click on the Movie button to find the movie you want to play.

3.       Click on Player to change players if necessary (this depends on which version of Windows you have).

4.       Click on Play.

FlipBook will launch the player you selected and play the file.

Note: On the Mac this all happens automatically.

GIF

GIF files are smaller, which makes them good for posting on the internet or including in emails. However, the image quality is not as good and playback speed cannot be guaranteed.

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.

Telecine

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.

Stills

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.

Individual Cels

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.

Combined Cels

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.

Composited Frames

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.

Painting and Image Editing

FlipBook makes painting very fast and easy. There are several features that you may not be familiar with unless you’ve worked with some of the other animation programs that cost several thousand dollars or more.

FlipBook stores the lines and the fills in separate files and edits them with different 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 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.

Despeckle

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. 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

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.

Tool Box

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. 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.

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. We call this “Paint by Numbers” because it paints the number of frames that you select.

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.

Note: The Leak Finder only 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 (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.

QuickErase lets you erase without changing tools. Just right-click with the Fill tool to erase paint. This really comes in handy with AutoFinish. Sometimes there are areas that shouldn’t be painted even though they are enclosed by lines. AutoFinish can’t know this but QuickErase makes it easy to erase those areas without even having to change tools.

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. 

AutoFill

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.

Keyboard Shortcuts

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.

Color Palettes

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 on the 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 still 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 control and 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 on the label above the level whose palette you want to Export.

2.       Left-Click on the Export button in the Palette section of the dialog.

3.       Select the location to which you want to Export the Palette.

4.       Give the Palette a name.

5.       Click on Save and then OK.

To Import a Color Palette…

1.        Right-Click 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 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

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 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 loaded into the image window and the palette will appear.  Save your changes by clicking on File > Save As Model.

Boomerang

This is a very powerful feature because it lets you use Photoshop, or Painter 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 Photoshop and load the image. When you’re through editing the image close the window inside Photoshop 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.

 

To set your image editor…

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 Registered File Types.

5.       Click on the Advanced button at the bottom of the Folder options dialog.

6.       If there is an “edit” command in the list of Actions 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” to the Action box.

9.       Click on Browse to select your favorite image editing program.

10.    Click on OK to close each dialog.

11.     Repeat steps 4 through 9 for to for TGA files too.

On the Mac,

 

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.

Tone Mattes

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 of the character.  The layers can also be renamed to make it easier to keep track of your tone mattes.

AutoMatte

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.

Scanning and Painting Hand-Drawn Tone Mattes

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

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.

Groups

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 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.

Peg and Group Centers

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

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.

Holds

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.

Moves

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.

Fields

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.

Zoom Steps

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.

Pan Steps

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.

Ease-In and Ease-Out

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.

Curved Path Camera Moves

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.

Technical Support

If you can't find the answers to your questions please email techsupt@digicel.net or call us Monday - Friday 9AM-5PM Arizona time so we can help.

 

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All Rights Reserved

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