Elemento My Dear Watson

Software: Cutout Pro Stickman
Click here to download.

Many users ask me about pictures in Elemento and how to create skeleton without creating matrix layers and renaming them.

This is how you import a picture into Elemento:
1. Add an image node from the toolbox.
2. Use the Open File action at the bottom.
or
Goto File->Import->Photoshop layers (if you use Photoshop).

There is a simple way to create skeleton, but it requires two things:
1. Group the graphics into matrix layers
(orelse Elemento does not know what a body part is)
2. Add control points with bone tool (F3).

Stickman 5.5 New Interface

Create cartoons and cutout movies with Stickman.
Click here to download.

Stickman 5.5 is released. This is the new design:

Image Paint in Elemento

Stickman 5.3.2 is released.
Download Here

Finally Elemento got an image paint editor!
To use it, select an image element or create a new one from the toolbox.
Then select the "Image Paint" action (bottom of the screen) and the "Paint Image...".

Editor functionality:
- Pen
- Fill
- Erase (Pen and Fill)
- Right-click in image to pick color
- Undo
- Center
- Change resolution
- Zoom

Z Order Editor

Stickman Animation 2D Software
Download here

A problem Stickman animators have is to decide the display order of body parts.
For example, in one scene, I may wish to have the left arm before the body, in another scene behind the body. This is solved by grouping the body parts into visibility nodes and add them as sub nodes to a zorder element. The hazzle is to program the ZValues property with control points to control the depth.

Before:



In most cases, there are no need to animate the body part draw order. A better way is to have a tool to setup the z order in the beginning of the animation.

Stickman 5.2.28 got now an editor tool in 'Edit Fonts and Colors' dialog to edit the body part draw order. This is only done once per scene and affects the figure through the whole animation.

Now:



All you need to do is to group the body parts in visibility nodes and add them as sub nodes to a zorder element. Then add the figure to the scene and select Figure->Edit Fonts and Colors.

This new feature solves one of the biggest hazzles within figure design.

Swing Test Animation

Stickman 2D Animation Software
Download here

This is a small test animation I created:

Spaceship

Stickman Animation Software
Download here

Did you know that you can use Elemento Figure Creator in 2D games developement?
Instead of spending much time adjusting parameters under game development,
you can create a simple model of your avatar in Elemento.
It requires little code and uses the same coordinate system as many 2D games.
This is possible because Elemento allows you to do physics simulations.

For example, to rotate a matrix node, add the following expression
to the Rotate property:

.Rotate+TurnKey()*DeltaTime()



You can read more about these functions by going to
View->Object Browser

About Simulation and Stickman Physics

Stickman Animation Software - Download

This is the software algorithm that was the beginning of Stickman, now 7 years ago.
Bone simulation keeps two control points in constant distance.

Given two points, p1, p2 and constant distance n (scalar).
diff = p1 - p2
delta = n - |diff| (|diff| is the absolute value of diff, length of vector)
diff *= delta / |diff|
p1 += diff * delta * 0.5
p2 -= diff * delta * 0.5

You can replace 0.5 with 0.4 to have less stiffer simulation.
Iterate for each bone many times (10+)
Simulation with rigids, feedback and rope are company secrets, so I can't tell you.