Synfig/C2/E-card-animation/English-timed
From Script | Spoken-Tutorial
Time | Narration |
00:01 | Welcome to the Spoken Tutorial on “E-card animation” using Synfig. |
00:05 | In this tutorial, we will learn to create an E-card animation using some png images. |
00:11 | Here, we will learn to- import png format images, |
00:16 | animate the images, |
00:18 | do text animation, |
00:20 | preview the animation, |
00:22 | render the animation in avi format. |
00:25 | For this tutorial, I am using Ubuntu Linux 14.04 OS, |
00:32 | Synfig version 1.0.2 |
00:35 | Let us open Synfig. |
00:38 | Go to Dash home and type Synfig. |
00:42 | You can open Synfig by clicking on the logo. |
00:47 | Now, let us start creating the e-card animation. |
00:52 | We need to first save our Synfig file. |
00:56 | Go to File and click on Save. |
00:59 | Select the folder in which to save. |
01:02 | Type the filename as E-card-animation and click on the Save button . |
01:07 | First we will go to the Toolbox and click on the Rectangle tool. |
01:12 | Then draw a rectangle on the canvas as demonstrated. |
01:17 | We will change the settings such that the imported image fits inside the canvas. |
01:23 | To do so, go to Edit. Click on Preferences and then on Misc. |
01:30 | Click on the option Scaling new imported image to fix canvas. |
01:35 | Now, click on Ok. This option will import the images such that they fit within the canvas. |
01:44 | Please note: We need to import the images in png format. |
01:49 | This is because other image formats like jpg/jpeg behave differently on the Synfig canvas. |
01:58 | Also, after rendering, the output quality is better when png images are used. |
02:05 | Let’s come back to the Synfig interface. |
02:09 | Go to File and click on Import. |
02:12 | I have saved the required images in the E-card-animation folder, inside my Documents folder. |
02:20 | These images are provided in the Code files link, on this webpage itself. |
02:26 | Please locate the link “Code files” and save the images on your machine. |
02:31 | Now, practise along with me. |
02:34 | Select the Bg image and click on Import. |
02:37 | We get the Bg image on the canvas. |
02:41 | To resize the image- first hold the orange dot or the orange duck and move the mouse in or out as shown, to make the Bg image fit the canvas. |
02:55 | Now, select the Cake image in the folder and click on Import. |
03:00 | We get the Cake image on our canvas. In the same way, import all the other images too. |
03:08 | Observe, we have three new layers named - Cake, Flowers and Balloons. |
03:14 | Let us now resize these images. Go to Layers panel. |
03:19 | First select the Cake layer. Observe that on selection, the resize handles appear on the canvas. |
03:27 | Click on the orange dot and resize the Cake image. |
03:32 | Repeat the same process and resize the other two images also. |
03:38 | Now, move the images and keep them outside the canvas, as demonstrated. |
03:45 | Then go to the Animation panel. Click on Turn on animate editing mode icon. |
03:52 | Place the Time cursor on 30th frame. |
03:56 | Select the Cake layer. |
03:58 | Move the Cake image to the left bottom of the canvas, as shown. |
04:05 | Next, select the Balloons layer. |
04:08 | Place the Time cursor on the 30th frame. |
04:11 | Go to Keyframes panel and click on Add a keyframe. |
04:16 | Now, place the Time cursor on the 48th frame. |
04:21 | Go to Keyframes panel and click on Add a keyframe. |
04:27 | Move the Balloons image to the mid-left of the canvas. |
04:31 | Again, place the Time cursor on the 60th frame. |
04:36 | Go to Keyframes panel and click on Add a keyframe. |
04:41 | Move the Flowers image to the right bottom of the canvas. |
04:47 | Next, we will add a line of text to go with this animation. |
04:52 | Before that, let me switch off the animation. |
04:57 | To do so, click on Turn off animate editing mode icon. |
05:02 | Let us add the text. Since the default Fill colour is white, the text will not be visible on the white background. |
05:12 | So, I will change this colour to black. |
05:16 | Now, go to the Toolbox and click on the Text Tool. |
05:20 | Then click anywhere on the canvas. We get Input text dialog box. |
05:27 | Here, we will type the text “Happy Birthday”. |
05:32 | Click on Ok. |
05:36 | Observe that we can now see the text on the canvas. |
05:40 | Now, go to the Layers panel and select the text layer. |
05:45 | Next go to the Parameters panel and click on Size. |
05:51 | Change its value to 80 pixels and then change the colour value to violet. |
05:57 | Go to the Toolbox and click on the Text Tool. Once again click on the canvas. |
06:04 | We get another Input text dialog box. |
06:09 | In this text box, type: “Have a wonderful, happy, healthy birthday now and forever”. |
06:21 | And then click on Ok. We can now see this text also on the canvas. |
06:27 | Go to the Parameters panel and click on Size. |
06:32 | Change the value to 30 pixels and change the colour to black. |
06:38 | Now, let’s go to the Layers panel. |
06:41 | Click on the first text layer and change the name of that layer to Happy Birthday. |
06:48 | Similarly, click on the other text layer and change the layer name to Now and Forever. |
06:56 | It is a good habit to name the layers appropriately. |
07:01 | This will help us to locate them easily in the future. |
07:06 | Now, move the text layers outside the canvas, as demonstrated. |
07:13 | Click on Turn on animate editing mode icon. |
07:18 | Then, go to Layers panel. Select the Happy Birthday layer. |
07:24 | Now, Place the Time cursor on the 72nd frame. |
07:29 | Go to Keyframes panel and click on Add a keyframe. Move the text as demonstrated. |
07:37 | Next, go to the Layers panel and select Now and forever layer. |
07:44 | Then place the Time cursor on the 90th frame. |
07:48 | Go to Keyframes panel and click on Add a keyframe once again. |
07:55 | Now, go to the canvas and move the text Now and forever as demonstrated. |
08:02 | Now save our Synfig file. |
08:05 | Go to File and click on Save. |
08:09 | Let us now check the preview. Go to File and then click on Preview. |
08:15 | Set the quality as 0.5 and Frame per second as 24. |
08:24 | Click on the Preview button. Then click on the Play button. |
08:29 | We can see a preview of the animation on the screen. |
08:33 | Close the Preview window. |
08:35 | Lastly, let us render the animation. |
08:38 | To do that, click on File and then on Render. |
08:43 | Go to the Render setting window. |
08:46 | Click on Choose. Open the Save render as window. |
08:50 | Click on Document. Click on E-card-animation folder. |
08:55 | Change the name to E-card-animation.avi. |
09:00 | Click on Target drop down menu. Select the extension as ffmpeg. |
09:06 | Click on the Time tab and change the End time to 110. Then click on Render. |
09:20 | Let us check our animation. Go to Documents. |
09:24 | Double Click on E- card-animation folder. |
09:26 | Select E- card-animation.avi . |
09:30 | Right-click and play the animation using Firefox web browser. |
09:39 | With this, we have come to the end of this tutorial. |
09:44 | Let us summarize. In this tutorial, we learnt to create an E-card animation. |
09:50 | We also learnt to: import images, |
09:54 | animate the images, do text animation, |
09:57 | preview the animation and render the animation in .avi format. |
10:04 | Here is an assignment for you. Locate the Flower image which is provided in the Code files link. |
10:11 | Using the Flower images, create a similar animation. |
10:16 | The video at the following link summarizes the Spoken Tutorial project. Please watch it. |
10:23 | We conduct workshops using Spoken Tutorialsand give certificates. Please contact us. |
10:31 | Please post your timed queries in this forum. |
10:35 | Spoken Tutorial project is funded by NMEICT, MHRD, Government of India. |
10:42 | This is Shital Joshi along with the Spoken Tutorial Animation Team from IIT Bombay, signing off. Thanks for joining. |