Flash CS4 vs. Toon Boom Animate: Character Animation Comparison: Part 1

[tubeNyou82]

There is a way in Flash CS4 to swap your symbols while using the Bone tool. You have to deal with symbols inside of symbols. I'm not gonna explain it further but it can be done. It also takes a while to animate simple movements and actions :(

CS6 is coming out soon, maybe they've made some changes...

[cartoonsmartlessons]

@tubeNyou82 Yeah it can be done with As3 too, but neither solution is good workflow for an animator. We shouldn't be coming up with tedious workarounds to bend the program to our needs. I love Flash for everything but animation. And I've played the waiting game over the past 5 or 6 versions where each time we say "maybe the next version will be the one". Its getting worse, really, if this IK is something they think works... Toon Boom Animate is the animator friendly version of Flash.

[FlowerPowerGuy]

OMG I am now buying toomboom just imagine how much easier lip sinking will be.

[makiney13]

hi, the only question i`ve got is, in flashcs4, you can draw an arm, i mean, a fully arm and then applie the tool bone, and i find that quite good, is there anything like that in the toon boom?, i dont want to read "well, by far you have to draw evertything separately to get a better animation", sorry if my question looks to anoying or "bitchy" hehe, just want to know if there is the same principle in toon boom

[k4ba]

toon boom =p obviusly, only an asshole would say flash

[Simstyle12]

this is random but i don't think in lil bil they use cut out animation too lol. i might look that up .

[ChimeraProd]

Have you upgraded to Animate 2 yet? Do you think the new features justify a 300$ Upgrade? I'm still using 7.6, think thats still pretty good?

[daynee3]

IN Flash u can turn the drawing into a Graphic and do the same thing as substitution

[lescomicmaker]

ok in the flash example it looks like the drawing is just one drawing with the bone tool being used but in the toon boom example the body arm and hand are all on different layers and are symbols of their own.

[pyannaguy]

In fairness, this guy's been in the Flash business for a long time. I'm familiar. You can find people who vastly prefer Toon Boom. If you're waiting to spend your money, take some time and do all the weighing you can.

[richm64]

ToonBoom is far better for cartoon animation. It is a MAJOR pita working with the keyframes in Flash. Moving, duping, swapping, way too cumbersome.

[nextgen111]

Different people animate differently, try trials of both and see which works for you. Plus Flash is for more then just animation

[drumimator]

I find this video completely biased (towards Toon Boom) and a bit patronizing.

[mememe84]

your comment is funny since the video up-loader is a Flash guy really

[UzzieLeon]

Hey! This video has been so helpfull. I have a strong background in flash animation, and I have been delaying my swap to Toon Boom because I still haven't learned how to animate into it. Your video has shown me that I have to make that swap right now!! There's so much that I was missing using Flash over the years! Can you recomend me a good site of Toon Boom Tutorials? Thank you!

[boywonderAR]

this interface seems so much more convenient compared to the 2005 version of flash animation i used back in the day, im buying this for sure.

[MrWinkelNL]

hej i noticed that when you were trying to scale the hand in flash you actually had the whole timeline selected,, dont it work if you just select the last one?.. ah well, im creating lots of games with flash and its just totally it for me.. And i could be just me but that ToonBoom stuff totally doesnt seem like working smooth like flash..

Nice comparisson tough

[krickrack]

well nice comparison... I didn't know about Toon Boom :)

It's seems a fantastic program for 2d animation

I don't use Flash for complex animation like character animation so I don't really get annoyed with the new Bones system of CS4...

Actually, I find it quite useful sometimes but I understand that it's not perfect at all...

But Flash is not specialized in animation like Toon Boom seems to be :)

I really like Flash because of the mix of AS3 and animation :D

[TheOriginalStriker]

FBF > Tweens or whatever

[cartoonsmartlessons]

@Orpheus!!! This is a comparison of the INVERSE KINEMATICS in Flash CS4 and Animate. This is NOT a comparison between all types of animation in Flash. I would NEVER use the IK in Flash CS4 to regularly do animation. But the IK in Flash CS4 is a new feature, and one that is touted for character animators.

Using IK in Flash CS4, you MUST...

1. Use MovieClips.

2. Have everything on one layer (actually everything is put on one layer for you during the bone rigging)

3. No swapping with IK

[orpheusemerged]

Aah, my mistake! I retract my previous comment.

I will say however, that I just don't 'get' the allure of inverse kinematics to begin with, seems like it would be counter-intuitive to proper squash and stretch (cartoons don't need skeletons).

Every time I've encountered it, it's been a pain in my ass for very little gain.

[stringanime]

I use nothing but Graphics with bones in FLASH. However I would like to learn Toon Boom. My biggest Gripe is that Bones only work with Action Script 3.0 not 2.0

[Fantasmo81]

Do you really have to have everything on one layer?

Somewhere on YT i saw an animating of a leg, and it look like it is ONE vector drawing.

[orpheusemerged]

You obviously have no idea how to use Flash (and I say that entirely without malice)

Why are all of your Symbols on one Layer? Why aren't you using Motion Tweens, as is the standard practice? Why is your Sync on if you want to swap out Symbols halfway through a Tween? Why use Movie Clips instead of Graphics?

You could easily circumvent every one of your problems.

[HaatoSK]

toon boom ist better if you know work on it ... but flash is easier so i think flash its better .......

[darklight436]

paid by toon boom? nice

[cartoonsmartlessons]

@ invaderzim, the video is referring to objects on an IK chain (using the bone tool) You don't even get an option to choose between Shape or Motion when symbols are chained up. I've been using Flash since 1999. I'm guessing thats the same decade you were born, so don't question my authori-TAY!

=)

[invaderzim908]

dude ur obviously not that experienced with flash. with the scaling problem, all u have to do is change it from a standard tween to a shape tween. dude flash is better i think btw

[TriangularFilms]

invader was owned....haha

[greatgmasta]

Which one is worth my money in you're opinion? I'm not very good at drawing but I have learned how to use a few of the tools in both programs. Trying to get the right one but I don't know which one, can you help?

[cartoonsmartlessons]

uhhhhh (shuddering) at the thought of classic shape tweens. They are far from working fine. Its a gamble using those. Even just shape tweening a square, your top right corner vector point, might randomly jump to the bottom left. I've rarely found good uses for the classic shape tweens.

Shape tweens with IK though are much better. I do have some free lessons on that in the Free section on CartoonSmart. The vector points stay locked in closer to their corresponding bone joints.

[billyshake]

Yup, just looked at that in CS4 and you definitely have a point. I completely agree that the scale change on all keyframes is annoying -- but it's kinda funny that we're even like "this is unacceptable! Why isn't it animating for me in this one instance!" Can you imagine someone like Art Babbit hearing us say that?

[billyshake]

It's a great tutorial for toon boom -- but that skew issue in CS4 would work fine if you used the classic (shape) tween instead of the standard CS4 tween.

[Jagatia]

I love this...thx.

[zaksam34]

Very Good demo , thanks........vive Toon boom Digital Pro