( читать по-русски | Russian translation )

It’s ten days passed by since the new version of Synfig Studio got officially released but I guess it’s never too late to announce it here. ^__^

Synfig Studio 0.64.0 splash screen by Nikolai Mamashev

This release includes the brand-new cairo rendering engine, as well as our improvements – simple plugins system and disabled keyframes. That’s it – the features developed during the work on Morevna Project Demo now officially included into Synfig and this is a significant milestone for us, of course.

Download Synfig Studio 0.64.0

And yes, Synfig isn’t crashing anymore when you try to disable keyframes. ~_^ The new version also includes the stickman template, available as a plugin called “Simple Skeleton”. That means the stickman is now a part of Synfig Studio and will be updated with its development. Though, we do not exclude possibility of publishing more alternative versions of stickman, but they will be provided as Synfig plugins from now.

Read the complete list of new features

In addition to the basic character template released yesterday, we are publishing another one – it’s Sita from the “Sita Sings the Blues” animated movie by Nina Paley.

Click here to download full package with both characters

The character is traced and rigged by Nikolay Mamashev.

License: CC-Zero 1.0

Enjoy!

As it was promised, today we’re releasing all files for our character template. That’s it – we’re publishing the basic charater for you to play with and reuse. Under the terms of CC-Zero 1.0 license, of course.

Click here to download the latest version

Also, there is a github repository for those who love to clone, fetch and fork. ^__^

To use the template you will need the latest versions of Synfig Studio and Papagayo, which we have updated as well. Please get them at the software page.

But there’s not all. During the last period we worked hard testing the template and end up with more than one character. So we decided to publish them all. That means instead of single sample character you will get a library of characters. Expect more characters to be added in just a few hours.

Workshop

Also, if you remember, today is the day of my workshop at LGM, where I will be explaining how to use this template. Everyone who is planning to participate in the workshop, please working files here.

Please don’t forget to install the latest versions of Synfig Studio and Papagayo (from the software page).

For the people who cannot attend the workshop, I’ll try to record the screencast, combine with the video and publish it online. That surely take some time, but let’s hope that will work out finally.

That’s it, stay tuned!

Hey, it’s been a long time! Let me share some quick news with you.

If you remember, in November I have planned  a lot of stuff to be done by February. Unfortunately, none of the outlined tasks are completed by the moment. That means we are not ready to launch the new episode of Morevna now and this initiative will be postponed for a few months.

But that doesn’t mean we were doing nothing on that period. In fact, our efforts gone into unexpected direction. We’ve been put into the situation that forced us to concetrate on developing the technology which allows to produce simple character animation in the very short time. This development resulted in the special character template for Synfig. It is based on the stickman template, but introduces such featureas as IK emulation, library of reusable elements and mimic controls. In the video below you can see it in action.

(more…)

If you examine our sources, you may notice that when we work on character animation, we usually place every character in separate Synfig file. This approach have certain advantages. For example, it becomes possible to have several people working on the same shot at once. Also, when you have shot split into pieces, you have much faster rendering/redraw speed when working on single piece…

(more…)

For a long time people asked for the tutorial explaining how to use Stickman Template and finally I have come up with something that might be called a tutorial. In fact those videos were recorded in different time (you might notice the differences in interface elements), but watching everything in sequence should give you the whole picture. Big thanks to Anna Orlova for translation and subtitling.

(more…)

Morevna Project is proudly presents an update of Stickman Template. Stickman Template is used for character animation. It tends to simplify setup when you want to make animation in cutout technique or something more complex.

Changes:

• Now stickman’s parts are automatically stretched depending on the bone length.
• Additional scale and rotation controls for head.

Enjoy!

Download Stickman Template

Morevna Project is proudly presents an update of Stickman Template. Stickman Template is used for character animation. It tends to simplify setup when you want to make animation in cutout technique or something more complex.

Changes:

• New version includes dummy regions to quickly navigate through stickman structure. Just click on any gray region and start creating your graphics on top of it.
• Additional exported values (stickman-amount/show-fillers) allows you to control stickman appearance.
• General template  structure was improved – it is easy to change order of stickman’s parts now.

Also notice the license change – it’s CC Zero now! Enjoy!

Download Stickman Template

Stickman video

During the drawing of keyframes for scene 20 we decided to concertize the motion of Ivan by using stickman. Generally, making stickman in Synfig is a simple task, but this one – with forward kinematic.

We made two videos about the process. First video is about finishing making stickman in Synfig Studio – only one hand left, and the head. Next one is about animating the top part of the stickman, Legs are already set up, animating the rest.

Sorry about the files size, but on YouTube those videos look just awful.

EDIT: There is a simpler approach of making stickman exists – without the need to use Radial Composite Converts and Rotate layers. Anyway, here’s two synfig stickman templates: stickman.sifz and stickman-simple.sifz. Enjoy!