[Niels]

Very soon we release the last alpha version (Alpha 8) – after that we go to beta. We don’t expect a lot of problems with that, because Animation Paper is already very stable. And then it is time for the official 5.0 release. It is hard to set a precise date, and it depends on possible unexpected findings, but later this year is realistic.

 

[Niels]

Hi Ethan, thanks for asking!

There’s a good reason why the painting tools (including bucket fill tool) doesn’t work. It’s because we haven’t implemented them in yet. 😉 Earlier in development of Animation Paper, we had a lot of greyed out menu items and tools, that was to come. We did this so people could get a view on what we where planning on doing. Now that the paint tools are more or less the only thing missing, I know it must be more confusing than informative. And that’s why, in the next release (Alpha 8) the whole Paint menu is hidden.

Paint and coloring are the very first features to be implemented after we have finalised the official v5.0 release. Paint/coloring will be a free 5.1 update.

To color you animation in the current situation, you can export your animation and color them elsewhere (like in Photoshop or the free Krita or whatever paint package you might have available). You can export as a sequence of PNG frames with numbering showing where any clones might be and layer information. A more advanced way of exporting is using OCA (Open Cell Animation), that enables you to export to multiple other software and transfer information on timing, layers, FPS, etc. More about OCA here: https://animationpaper.com/animation-paper-oca-export-for-pc/

Let me know if you have additional questions!

Thanks,
Niels

[Niels]

Thanks a lot Link Komas!

The color features are coming as the first free update after the official 5.0 release. This includes fill tool. I’m looking so much forward to it my self! 😉

Perspective tool is also on our todo-list, but more vaguely defined at the moment. It would be interesting for me to know what exactly it is you need from a perspective tool. What’s your dream perspective? 😉

Thanks again,
Niels

[Niels]

Thanks very much for your kind words!

I am happy to let you know that an autosave/backup feature is exactly what we have ready for our very next release (Alpha 8)! We are right now working on the last issues on Alpha 8 – and as soon as we are ready with that we can release it. A matter of days/few weeks.

Best,
Niels

[Niels]

Yes, me too! 😉 Thank you!

[Niels]

Hi Arely, Yeah, the last Alpha release was almost a year ago now. We planned to go beta only a couple of months later. But we had a major unforeseen setback because our main programmer Frederik sadly had to leave the project so close to the finish line. Since then we have changed programmer 3 times, which have used a lot of time. Almost a year – very unfortunate for progress. In long periods we have had to just wait standing still. However, we are now very happy with Alex, who is our new main programmer. Things will be back to a good steady pace from now on. Alpha 8 is finished very soon and we will then go to beta and the finished release next. Very exciting!

[Niels]

Thanks a lot Alex! It’s funny, Merge Layer is something that has been on our todo-list since the very beginning. We have kept pushing it, because other stuff seemed more important – even though a merge layer feature is obviously important and necessary. The funny thing is, that you are the only one ever mentioning it. Nobody else has asked about it, so that’s why we have kept postponing it – making all the other features instead. 😉 Apparently people did not need Merge Layer. 😀

The Alpha 8 release is super close. Merge Layer will be part of the release after that, which is the first beta.

[Niels]

I like it a lot! It’s great! Thanks for showing it.

[Niels]

Hi John,

If I understand you correctly, you want to do animation in Animation Paper – and you want to make sure they will display properly on your WordPress website?

No problem! When you work in Animation Paper, you save your scene as an .ap file. This is the best format for saving everything and loading it back into Animation Paper again if you want to continue your work.

When you are finished, you will want to export your animation. You go to File -> Export -> Movie Clip and select MP4. MP4 is a great format for compatibility and very good for displaying on websites, including yours.

Let me know if you have further questions.

Cheers,
Niels

[Niels]

Thanks for your input – much appreciated!

Maybe you are already aware of this, Animation Paper does already have a kind of clever stabiliser build in, working at all times. But it doesn’t have any user options. It is different compared to others way of doing it, where it is merely some kind of smoothing/dampening.

But I appreciate why many people would like to have exactly that – especially because they are used to it from other software. Can you try to describe what exactly it is you are looking for in a stabiliser? Interesting for me to know and learn. We might be able to do something 😉

Shape tools like rectangle and circles I have steered away from deliberately in order to keep things simple and “analogue” in feel. I don’t want too much “technical” stuff, numbers, percentages, vector points, etc – if it can be avoided. Basically freehand drawing is what’s emphasised. I hope you see my point. However, I actually have straight lines on our todo – I see how they could be helpfull and done in a simple none-cluttering way.

Anyway, thanks a lot for your nice words. Let me know what your further thoughts are.

Best,
Niels

[Niels]

Wow, thanks for sharing all this Herb. Fun and interesting read. I’m sure many of us have similar stories to tell. I had a Commodore PET like your brother, but real creativity for my part came when I got the Commodore 64. 😉 I did my first “character animation” on that and several of my own software and tools. 🙂

Would be interesting to know how you see the future of all this. What do you think is next for you and for the animation world?

Cheers,
Niels

[Niels]

I’m sure it did – and does! Thank you!

[Niels]

Sorry Herb, the guy you replied to is a spammer. I’ve shown him out. 😉 I constantly have to remove obvious and bad spam on this forum. It just happened that the subject of his spam here was somewhat within the subject – and not some escort agency in Delhi. 😀

[Niels]

You are definitely not boring me Alessio! 🙂 I am just sad that we can’t make it work for you – and you are in this situation where you want to upgrade your system, but can’t because of other good software running only on Win7.

I hope you find a good solution that’s hopefully not too expensive. Thank you and good luck to you too!

[Niels]

Actually, I can see from our installation records, that a few Win7 users did actually manage to install and run Animation Paper. So at least for some it does work.

I have now dug up three old releases we’ve made. Maybe there’s a change one of them will work for you. Worth a try at least.

Here’s Alpha 1, Alpha 3 and Alpha 5…

https://www.dropbox.com/s/a0txhtiwegwyo19/AnimationPaper-Alpha1_x64.msi?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4dp34or7qlw20pm/AnimationPaper-Alpha3_x64.exe?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/irenqfien91oage/AnimationPaper-Alpha5_x64.exe?dl=0

Fingers crossed!