PSP : MAKING ANIMATIONS TRANSPARENT (TUT 4)

Animation Shop Image Tutorials | Submited Mar 3, 2008

Written by:

Tut No. 4 - Transparent Animations

[NOTE: It might be a good idea if you use this image to change to text color from black to white, I kinda forgot that the Skem background is black which means you cannot read black text on a black background!!].

1. Open up your animation in Animation Shop.


2.
We want to select all the frames by - using keyboard [b]Ctrl-A or Edit > Select All


3. Next click on the dropper tool

4. In the first frame place the dropper tool within the teal color section

and left (or right) click.

5. If you look at the color palette you will see the color you have just picked with the dropper (mine is at the top, which is a left click with the mouse).


Now we are going to alter all 7 frames from the teal color to become transparent as follows.

6. On your color palette left click on the teal color to get the html color code.

My color code is #07858F.

7a. Take a copy of the code - using the keyboard Ctrl-C - click OK.

7b. Now go Animation > Replace Color


8a. You will get this drop down menu
and the sections with a red box will be the areas that will need changing.

8b. So click on the old color box and the color chart will appear. Simply paste your html color code that you have just copied in the HTML color code box and click OK.

8c. The tolerance section is usually "trial and error" depending on the amount of color you have, but do not go above 100. So for ths tut I am going to change the tolerance from 20 to 100.

8d. Make sure the last section is set to Transparent Opacity.

Your screen should look like this.


9. Click OK.

You will now see that all 7 frames of your animation, which were originally teal, are now transparent (you can only see the 5 frames here).


Now repeat points 3 to 9 to replace the yellow and purple to transparent sections (always remember to ensure that all the frames are selected).

Yellow (code: #d2f600) - alter the replace color screen to these settings

click OK

Purple (code: #8A05AF) - alter the replace color screen to these settings

click OK

Your image should now look something like this.


Everything looks transparent, but sometimes images/text have shadows, which slightly darken the original color, if you zoom in on a frame you will see that there is still color showing - example.


This is one of the reasons why it is so frustrating and annoying altering animations.

The only way to get rid of all the color is to again make sure all the frames are selected, and then repeat steps 3 to 9 using the dropper tool to click on the color to get the code and then replace to transparent (it is usually better if you Zoom right in and take the color from the last frame of the animation, this way you can be sure that you do not miss anything in the earlier frames).


IMPORTANT because the area of color is small, you MUST lower the tolerance from 100 to around 20 - any higher and you will end up erasing your animation entirely.


You have to keep repeating this until all the color has disappeared. In my example I needed to repeat steps 3-9 six times.

Now that all the color is gone and the image is transparent we need to set the animation speed and save.

10. Select all the frames and then using keyboard Alt-Enter or Animation > Frame Properties


11. You will get this menu

alter the animation speed to your desired setting - I've gone for 55. Then click OK

12. Click on the view animation icon .

If you are happy with the speed SAVE and follow the wizard.
If you are not happy with the speed just follow points 10-12 until you are happy then SAVE.

Here is my final image. (As I said in the NOTE at the beginning - LOL - I had to change the color of the text at the last minute when I realised that the tut would be on a black background, and of course you wouldn't be able to see the animation with black text on a black background. If you use the same image, then change the color, in exactly the same way as shown above, but instead of choosing Transparent Opacity, click on the section new color).