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Animation Panel You can create funny animations or slideshows by combining a sequence of frames and adding them to the Animate Panel. The resulting animations can be saved in GIF or SWF (Flash) format. Either work well. GIF files can be read by almost any application that can display common image types, including web browsers. SWF is a popular format for web pages because the individual frames are compressed for an overall smaller output file.
The Frames Per Second setting determines how fast the frames are played back. For reference, regular (non-animated) film is projected at 24 frames per second (FPS). Animated cartoons are typically projected around 12 FPS. Disney animated movies have been reported as being projected at 18 FPS, which is likely true given the fluidity and quality of movement of the characters. Check the Loop Animation checkbox if you want your animation to play continuously. If you do not check this box, the animation will simply stop on the last frame and remain static. To remove any individual frame, click the desired frame to select and click the Delete button. To clear all frames, select the Delete All button. Creating an animation in Caricature Studio works just like classic animation; making each frame slightly different to create the illusion of movement. If you have the time and patience to create a lot of individual frames, you can approximate real animation. But for fun, it's easier to create fewer frames for more of a "slideshow" effect. How to create an animation:
Each frame should be different, so when combined they form an action sequence. The change in each frame can be subtle or it can be drastic, depending on the desired outcome. Here's an example: First, we'll open an image and click Add to save it as the first frame. Then we'll apply some caricature effects and click Add again, saving the altered image as the second frame. Finally, we'll apply more caricature effects and add a talk bubble with text, then click Add one more time to save it as the 3rd frame.
Finally, we'll click Save on the Animate Panel and select the GIF format. Here's the result:
For this example we've set the FPS to 1, but clicked the Add button twice for each image so that it spans two frames. So for 3 images we end up with 6 frames, and each image will be shown for 2 seconds. Since 1 second is the minimum FPS setting, you can do this if you'd like to display each image for more than one second. Here is the same sequence saved at an FPS setting of 6, meaning all 6 frames play within a single second:
You can make great custom avatars and web graphics using the Animate tool! If exporting to SWF (Flash) format, please note that you will need to embed some code in your webpage to properly display the image. How to code web pages is beyond the scope of this guide, but here is the basic code needed to display an SWF file within an HTML document: <html><body>
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