Animations

General

An animation consists of one or more sprites. Five arrow buttons at the top allow a very easy navigation. You can jump to the first/last frame or move forward/backward frame by frame. The button with a triangle is the 'play' button.

There is the option to import a frame sequence, ie. graphic files with the same filename, each ending with a different digit, e.g. step1.png, step2.png, step3.png etc. This makes it easier to use frame sequences exported with external programs from an AVI file.

The long white field next to the arrow buttons is a timeline. You can access to images of the animation by clicking on a sprite in the timeline. Clicking on it with the right mouse button opens a context menu. This offers you various actions - to insert, edit or delete a frame. If you select Add frame of Load/Edit frame a dialog opens. Here you can choose a file for the current frame. In case you want the frame to have a transparent colour simply click on the Activate Transparency checkbox. To choose the particular colour click on the Transparency button. Thereafter click on the colour on the image. The chosen colour will be displayed next to the Transparency button.

In the dialog for selecting the image file a Sound file can be selected as well. This sound is played with the selected Volume and Balance when the animation frame is displayed. Further an Action can be created which is also started automatically when the animation frame is displayed. If an animation frame contains a sound file or an action then it is shown in green in the timeline.

IMPORTANT: Usually loading of an animation is done when the animation is displayed. The animation will be deleted automatically when it is finished. If this behavior is not intended then the animation can also be loaded and deleted manually (see actionparts Preload animation and Unload animation).

Tools

Placing single Frames

This tool is located between the navigation arrows and the timeline. It parts the timeline into two subsections and one or two red points appear. The red point marks the image which can be used as an orientation point where to place the current frame. You can move this point by clicking on the lower timeline. If you put it away, use drag and drop and place it underneath the black point. To move the sprite of the current frame, use drag and drop, too. The image is drawn half-transparent and all sprites of frames are shown which are marked with a red point.

Animation Properties

Pause [ms]

Configure how long each frame is shown (in ms).

Animation loops

Configure how often an animation is going to be repeated. With 0 the animation will be repeated inifitely (if Infinite is selected then the number of loops will be set to 0 automatically).

Infinite

The animation will be repeated infinitely if selected (e.g. waterfall).

Random loop pause

The animation will be replayed after a random pause between 5 and 30 sec. For example, you can use this for a plane flying in the background. This option should only be chosen eighter if you set Loops to a value greater than 1 or if infinite is checked.

Play Backwards

Plays animation backwards (last image first...).

Play in random Order

Show frames of the animation in random order (only makes sense if order does not matter, e.g. waterfall).

Set Pause for each single frame

If selected then the pause must be selected for each single frame. This can be done in the field which is right to the timeline.

Reset Position after one loop

This is only important if the animation frames are moving. Example: an animation with 2 frames is repeated 5 times. The second frame is moved 10 pixels to the right. If the position is reset after a loop then the animation will still be at the same position after 5 loops. If the position is not reset then the animation moves 10 pixels to the right after each loop.

Position of Animation changes vertically

Choose this only if the animation moves from top to bottom or vice versa on the scene. Normally you will not need to use this option; but if there occurs a drawing error when playing it, try this option and check for the error again.

Start the following action after the animation is finished

If the last animation loop is finished the selected action will be executed.