Cutout Animation Tool - Blender

razcore.rad · February 18, 2016, 11:20am

So basically, how would one solve this problem? Just through Z dimension ordering? (I hope not :D)

m9105826 · February 18, 2016, 12:06pm

Very slight Z offsets based on Photoshop layer order is how I assume it’s done in the video in the first post.

ndee · February 18, 2016, 9:56pm

Hey guys, I know there was no update for a long time. But I am actively working on the addon. Actually it is in a pretty good shape.
I want one thing to finish before I release it.

Currently I am working on a seamless workflow between godot and blender. I have it working almost completely. You can animate your character in blender and then just export/import it to godot and everthing is transitioned. Sprites, Bones hieararchy and animations. The prototype works pretty good already.

I will make a new video soon. If somebody is interested in testing, feel free to contact(pm) me.

razcore.rad · February 18, 2016, 10:22pm

That’s very good news, I was hoping you’d let us know about the status of this. I’ll continue digging my own little addon, just to gather knowledge, but I don’t think it will be even close to yours :). Anyway, I’d like to offer one suggestion: make that ALT + CLICK thing (if I remember correctly) for parenting bones a separate addon, that one seems to be general enough to be good irrespective of this cutout addon. You can then have the cutout addon have that one as a dependency or something. Can’t think of any other stuff… your work is pretty amazing.

dumbnudge · February 19, 2016, 2:19am

Wow. This looks great, Andreas.I’m impressed by the add-on’s complexity and workflow.

IMO the design of your layer system (unlimited Layers, search, select, favorite filter) should replace blender’s default layers.
This seems like a great improvement over the current layout management addon’s design.

Do you mind if I propose this to the devs?

Keep it up, I’m patiently awaiting the release.

razcore.rad · February 19, 2016, 6:52am

OK so, because Andreas is working actively on this and because I think this was a good (enough) exercise for me, I’m gonna’ mark this addon of mine as “complete” :). If you guys are curious to give it a spin, you can find it here. At the moment this is what it does:

import images as planes using a JSON file which defines the layout
warn user if JSON files point to missing files (possibility to skip missing files, otherwise it basically cancels the operation)
ability to import from multiple JSON files
group images based on the JSON file name (if users chooses so)
let user select Z step

It’s enough for my use and I learned some new stuff. It exposes some of the options from “Import Images as Planes” addon (because it’s a dependency), the ones I thought relevant for the cutout stuff. It’s MIT license so anyone can take it and convert it into something else if they want to… if it’s useful :).

It was a good exercise for me.
P.S. Of course let me know of any bugs if you try it out. Thanks

ndee · February 19, 2016, 6:55am

@gumbnudge
I wouldn’t call this layers directly. Its just a list of child objects of the “sprite_object”. From there I can hide and show them easily. Thats it ^^

@razvanc87
I don’t think the armature assign would make sense for many other cases. Or at least I haven’t thought that through alot. It works in 2D pretty good. In 3D with one single mesh it could be harder. But I am not sure.
Edit Just saw your post. Sounds really like a good exersice. I love it to try prototypes. Wiriting prototypes is the best part. Making things stable can be really annoying ^^

m9105826 · February 19, 2016, 8:41am

I’d definitely like to see the fast-bone-parent thing as a separate addon. It could save a ton of time for things like armor, robots, and other hard surface objects where you want bones to uniformly control entire pieces uniformly.

razcore.rad · February 19, 2016, 10:09am

OK, slight modifications:

added optional global_x and global_y per JSON file so you can offset globally each import (this is relevant for multiple JSON selection)
warn user if there are parsing errors (if JSON doesn’t comply to the specified format) and trying to complete the action results in no import

@ndee
yah I agree, prototyping is the best :))

ndee · February 19, 2016, 2:39pm

To everyone who is interested. I just recorded a small devlog of the current state. Showcases blender/godot workflow very good:

blurymind · February 19, 2016, 5:25pm

Awesome progress ! Does it support smooth deformations? As far as i know godot doesnt support them yet. If you support them in the json file (smooth def data gets exported) it would be awesome to have that feature in godot. Maybe someone could add it in the future? Even if godot doesnt support it, i hope your animation system hasnt lost it. I am very excited over this addon’s progress.

ndee · February 20, 2016, 9:34am

@ blurymind
no it doesn’t. Not for export. Smooth mesh deformations only work within blender. If you want to export to godot you have to use “normal” sprites.

kayzoku · February 20, 2016, 10:45am

@Ndee
I just saw your video in your channel on youtube, and honestly I smiled, this addon will be the best 2D animation tool ever.
For me i will participate at “Algeria Game Challenge” using Godot Game Engine, so i will definitely use this addon.
I wish you great luck.

razcore.rad · February 20, 2016, 11:38am

@ndee
just saw your video. It’s amazing, I think blender will start might just become the most used software for idie developers after you release your tool hahah (along side Godot :P).

Therahedwig · February 20, 2016, 1:43pm

ndee, that looks pretty darn impressive. Btw, might be interesting, but boud got commisioned to make a spriter scml exporter. I don’t think he’s gonna add spline jsons as well, but once he makes the commit it should be easy for you to discover which files should be modified for that.

ndee · February 20, 2016, 3:56pm

@Therahedwig
It would be cool if krita would support a python scripting api. Then we could just write an addon for that and distribute it without the need to compile krita ^^

blurymind · February 20, 2016, 4:00pm

Interesting. What would the exporter do exactly? Will it export krita layers as individual sprites (cropped)?
Or export krita cutout animation (which does not exist yet) as scml? In any case such functionality would be useful not only to spriter, but also to any other cutout animation software! Be it this addon, godot’s animation editor, spriter, spine or creature…

Godot does not support smooth deformations yet, so it’s understandable that ndee’s addon doesn’t export them. But I hope that in the future (godot 3.0?) we will have them? :yes:
And since blender can do them it would be nice to have them, eventhough godot wouldnt support them yet. Think of all the other game engines that could use this workflow. Some of them might get an implementation.

Even spriter doesnt export them yet, but they do have them as an experimental feature. It’s just a shame that Spine and Creature (being the most expensive options) - do have smooth deformations and the tools that I use or want to use dont have them yet. Smooth deformations can add a lot to a piece!

I think Ndee is right - scripting addon support (be it python, lua or something other) would be awesome to have! Perhaps a stretch goal for this year’s kickstarter?

razcore.rad · February 20, 2016, 11:38pm

guys,
Godot is planning 2D mesh-based sprite deformation for 2.1
Krita devs are already working/talking about implementing scripting in it, don’t know more than the pages say tho’ so we wait.

Therahedwig · February 21, 2016, 6:30am

I think Ndee is right - scripting addon support (be it python, lua or something other) would be awesome to have! Perhaps a stretch goal for this year’s kickstarter?

Bare minimum scripting support is about 4 times the amount of effort a regular stretch-goal would be worth, so be careful what you wish for. It’s not something you go ‘would be nice to have’ about. The plugin would be exported layers and their coordinates, Krita does not, and probably will never have bones.

Afaik, the problem with smooth deform type of stuff is that there’s no consensus on how to implement it.

blurymind · February 21, 2016, 11:00am

Juan postponed it to 3.0. They need to fix the renderer firs…