Post by VanillaOrchids on Apr 10, 2006 23:33:04 GMT -5
Since this tutorial is more so about the animation used in the signature that I made for a battle than the making of the sig itself, I am starting this tutorial at the point after I've done all I wanted with the actual design of the graphic.
In this example, I used a render that I downloaded from a render site. Once I had what I wanted as the main portion of the sig, I then dulplicated the render and resized it down so that you can see more of it and, of course, so that it is smaller. (Note: You don't have to use the same image for the animated part. I just chose to for this tutorial.)
As you can see from the printscreen below I duplicated layer two (which is the smaller version of the render) 9 times (total of 10 layer 2s). The number of times you need to duplicate it will depend on how much of the smaller render you want to appear at a time. The smaller the section, the more times you will have to duplicate it.
As you should also notice, in the image above, I have hidden all of the smaller render layers except for the Layer 2 Copy 2. That is because I want to keep solid Layer 2 whole and you need to see how your cuts are coming alone as you do it ... so you need to hide those layers you are not working with at the time.
Now take your selection tool and make a selection across the top of your graphic, like in the image below. Again, the size of the selection is up to you.
Once you have made your select go to SELECT > INVERSE (or Shft+Ctrl+I) and hit the DELETE button on your keyboard. Your image will now look like so:
Now Inverse the selection once again. Like so:
The reason I do that is so that I can then move the selection to just below what's left of the image. This helps to make sure you are cutting it exactly. So while you still have the selection tool selected, hit the ARROW DOWN key on your keyboard until the selection if just below the image.
Once you have done that, hide that layer in the layer palette and unhide Layer 2 Copy 3.
Continue the previous process until you've cut out your last section of the smaller render.
Now hide your last cut of the small render. At this point you can added a boder (as shown below), even add text if you like.
Now transfer to Image Ready.
Once in Image Ready, you will need to duplicate the animation layer.
Once you have the duplicated animation layer, go to your layer palette and unhide (click on the "eye" icon next to the appropriate layer to make it visible) the first cut of the small render.
Then duplicate that animation layer, hiding the cut of render and making the second cut visible. You will continue to do that until you have one animation layer for each cut of the render.
Duplicate the animation layer again. Hide the visible cut layer so that no piece of the cut render is visible. Duplicate that animation layer and go to the Layer Palette and now, unhide the solid Layer 2 layer. This will be your uncut small render layer.
At this point we are going to TWEEN the last layer with the layer right before it. So click on the tween button in the ANIMATION PALETTE.
For this particular example I have chosen to tween the animation using 8 layers.
The higher the number the longer the animation will take to complete.
Once you have done that, duplicate the last animation layer and hide the full small render (solid Layer 2)
Now tween once more, keeping the same settings you used the first time. These last two steps are what produces the fade in and fade out effect.
You can choose to "play" the animation as you go along so that you can see how it is progressing. And more often than not, you will have to adjust the speed of each animation layer. If you will notice in the printscreen above, I had the animation speed for the layers set to 0.02 but in the end I had to adjust them. I made the actual cut pieces 0.01 and the tweened layers I set to "no delay." Otherwise it wouldn't fade in and out smoothly. Probably the most difficult thing is figuring out what speed the frames should move at and it's basically a trial and error sort of thing, until you get it to were you think it looks good.
Now if you will notice, in almost anyone of the print screens, that there are some tabs above my image. Once you are ready to save, click on the 2-UP tab. This will show you your original image as well as your optimized output image.
In the OPTIMIZATION PALETTE you can adjust various things to make the file size smaller. Being able to see what the optimization will look like will help you to determine the how much you can optimized the image and still keep the image looking nice. The settings I used are visible in the image above however it won't always be the same. So it's best to adjust the settings with each new animation you make. Because what settings might be good for one image may not be good for another.
Ok, I think that's about it. Just click on FILE > SAVE OPTIMIZED AS and save your finished image.
In this example, I used a render that I downloaded from a render site. Once I had what I wanted as the main portion of the sig, I then dulplicated the render and resized it down so that you can see more of it and, of course, so that it is smaller. (Note: You don't have to use the same image for the animated part. I just chose to for this tutorial.)
As you can see from the printscreen below I duplicated layer two (which is the smaller version of the render) 9 times (total of 10 layer 2s). The number of times you need to duplicate it will depend on how much of the smaller render you want to appear at a time. The smaller the section, the more times you will have to duplicate it.
As you should also notice, in the image above, I have hidden all of the smaller render layers except for the Layer 2 Copy 2. That is because I want to keep solid Layer 2 whole and you need to see how your cuts are coming alone as you do it ... so you need to hide those layers you are not working with at the time.
Now take your selection tool and make a selection across the top of your graphic, like in the image below. Again, the size of the selection is up to you.
Once you have made your select go to SELECT > INVERSE (or Shft+Ctrl+I) and hit the DELETE button on your keyboard. Your image will now look like so:
Now Inverse the selection once again. Like so:
The reason I do that is so that I can then move the selection to just below what's left of the image. This helps to make sure you are cutting it exactly. So while you still have the selection tool selected, hit the ARROW DOWN key on your keyboard until the selection if just below the image.
Once you have done that, hide that layer in the layer palette and unhide Layer 2 Copy 3.
Continue the previous process until you've cut out your last section of the smaller render.
Now hide your last cut of the small render. At this point you can added a boder (as shown below), even add text if you like.
Now transfer to Image Ready.
Once in Image Ready, you will need to duplicate the animation layer.
Once you have the duplicated animation layer, go to your layer palette and unhide (click on the "eye" icon next to the appropriate layer to make it visible) the first cut of the small render.
Then duplicate that animation layer, hiding the cut of render and making the second cut visible. You will continue to do that until you have one animation layer for each cut of the render.
Duplicate the animation layer again. Hide the visible cut layer so that no piece of the cut render is visible. Duplicate that animation layer and go to the Layer Palette and now, unhide the solid Layer 2 layer. This will be your uncut small render layer.
At this point we are going to TWEEN the last layer with the layer right before it. So click on the tween button in the ANIMATION PALETTE.
For this particular example I have chosen to tween the animation using 8 layers.
The higher the number the longer the animation will take to complete.
Once you have done that, duplicate the last animation layer and hide the full small render (solid Layer 2)
Now tween once more, keeping the same settings you used the first time. These last two steps are what produces the fade in and fade out effect.
You can choose to "play" the animation as you go along so that you can see how it is progressing. And more often than not, you will have to adjust the speed of each animation layer. If you will notice in the printscreen above, I had the animation speed for the layers set to 0.02 but in the end I had to adjust them. I made the actual cut pieces 0.01 and the tweened layers I set to "no delay." Otherwise it wouldn't fade in and out smoothly. Probably the most difficult thing is figuring out what speed the frames should move at and it's basically a trial and error sort of thing, until you get it to were you think it looks good.
Now if you will notice, in almost anyone of the print screens, that there are some tabs above my image. Once you are ready to save, click on the 2-UP tab. This will show you your original image as well as your optimized output image.
In the OPTIMIZATION PALETTE you can adjust various things to make the file size smaller. Being able to see what the optimization will look like will help you to determine the how much you can optimized the image and still keep the image looking nice. The settings I used are visible in the image above however it won't always be the same. So it's best to adjust the settings with each new animation you make. Because what settings might be good for one image may not be good for another.
Ok, I think that's about it. Just click on FILE > SAVE OPTIMIZED AS and save your finished image.