So I'm making a game as a summer project. I've made a number of games before, but in the past I've explicitly avoided making games about anything that would require complex animations. Instead, I've always resorted to spaceship games, or puzzle games with only one animated sprite and procedurally-generated graphics, because the programs I've been using are not geared towards complex animation. I've been looking around Google, the Mac App Store, the iOS App Store, and elsewhere to see if there's a program that's good for making quality animated sprites. Before I commit to buying or downloading any of the options, I'd like to ask if there's anyone in this community with any experience animating sprites and whether they have any pointers.
For what I'd like to do, I'd prefer to have (in order of most preferred first):
-Good layer/object management -Onion skinning -Multiple undo operations (it's embarrassing how many programs DON'T support this) -Some kind of background "rotoscoping" feature that lets me trace over an existing image -Save to .png -Vector graphics, to render to multiple sizes without any loss in quality. Barring this, the size I'm working with is generally in the 32x32 to 128x128 range. Remember that I'm making game sprites. -It would be nice if there was a way to use an iPad with a stylus for fine control because I hate using the mouse to draw, especially since I'm left-handed. Note this only applies if the program only supports raster graphics; I can do vector art with a mouse reasonably enough -The program doesn't have to be free, but it shouldn't be too expensive for what I'm trying to do. I'm not intending to make super high-quality industry-grade sprites; I just want it to look presentable.
If I can find an easy-to-use program that works well, I'll save myself a lot of hassle downloading a bunch of free trials, or worse, actually buying something that turns out to not be what I want. Does anyone have any suggestions?
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
Macromedia flash maybe?
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Man, you JUST missed a deal on Anime Studio 7 for $29. Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Macromedia flash...
+1
Although it should be noted that it's now Adobe Flash.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
And there goes my opportunity to legitimately own Anime Studio Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Dude, you can get Anime Studio 8 for $50 at its regular price, and the Debut (lite) version for $8. That's not bank-breaking.
![[Frown]](frown.gif)