Use level strip without switching the view possible?

[Herbert123]

Does anyone know if it is possible to drag drawings from a level strip into column frames without the main view switching back to the level strip view all the time? It is great that we can drag, for example, eyes and mouth drawings to the x-sheet, but it is kinda annoying to have the main view jump back and forth between the level strip view and the x-sheet view.

[Greg Smith]

Good question, Herbert.  I am struggling with this, as we speak.

I'm finding that even though we can do a lot of drawing manipulation in the X-Sheet - I need the functions of the Automatic Inbetweener, as found in the Level Strip during most phases of animation.

When using the Level Strip "View", I also lose the context of the background, upon which my animation is based.

This forces me to transfer a simple "reference sketch", indicating the scope of a particular set of Level Drawings, into some frames of the Level Strip - which later must be removed - and which interfere with the Automatic Inbetweening function.

A simple option which allows the viewing of some Columns of the X-Sheet, for reference, to appear in the Level Strip View would be ideal.

Greg Smith

[Juls_3000]

Select drawings in level strip. Do "Expose in xSheet" to get  temporary the drawings in one column and drag it from there to your column ?. I don´t see why you find so annoying this change of view :)

[Herbert123]

That is not a solution: the point of the level strip is having visual access to all mouth shapes, for example, and dragging a specific mouth shape into the Xsheet column for the mouth. ALT-dragging replaces an existing frame with the new drawing.

This is really useful when animating cut-out characters. But the constant switching between the scene view and the level strip view is quite annoying and breaks this workflow somewhat. Rigged characters do have access to the drawing with a simple slider, but that slider does not display the drawings. The level strip does, but it would be great if the slider in the view would also display small thumbnails of those drawings in a drop-down, or something. Although I have to admit that in most cases just dragging the slider works quite well.

In the 2d animation addon for Blender that is exactly how it works: clicking on a character part will display a visual list of available elements for that part. Very handy:


One other thing that would be incredibly handy: entering a subsheet hides the rest of the scene. Often I'd like to be able to work in with subsheet-based character, but keep the scene as a reference.

For example, let's say I am animating two characters interacting with each other, and each character is put in the scene as a subsheet. Timing the subsheet characters' animations is made more difficult because I cannot tell what the other character(s) is (are) doing. I would have to time it by keeping track of the frames in the various Xsheets, which is awkward - in Flash a graphic symbol can be edited, while the rest of the scene is still visible (albeit in a grayed out version) and I can time things visually.

[Juls_3000]

Use skeleton that way could help ? https://workflowy.com/s/JtI13Zub8a#/92b887ffdb04

[Herbert123]

Typing the cell names is too slow - but I find that dragging the slider with the skeleton tool works quite fast too - and the drawings are visible in the level strip.

[Juls_3000]

Yes, to can edit sub-xSheets in context is a big lost, :) perhaps in v1.0.3 ....

"To edit a sub-xsheet in its context:

Right-click the related xsheet icon on the right of the menu bar, and

choose Enable Edit in Place from the menu that opens."

(User Guide pdf pag 217)

[Juls_3000]

Not sure if this is very orthodox ... in complicated cases, you can try to open a second OT instance (2) (not for editing, just for reference) And keeping this actualized  by means of  "Save all" on (1) and "File>Open recent scene" on (2). Three screens are a lot of screens :))) !!

[Herbert123]

Thanks, I have created an issue on Github.
https://github.com/opentoonz/opentoonz/issues/264

In my opinion this is rather essential to have in paperless cut-out animation.

[Juls_3000]

[Rodney Baker]

Herbert123

Apr 27 (23 hours ago)

Does anyone know if it is possible to drag drawings from a level strip into column frames without the main view switching back to the level strip view all the time? It is great that we can drag, for example, eyes and mouth drawings to the x-sheet, but it is kinda annoying to have the main view jump back and forth between the level strip view and the x-sheet view.

Oh... Oh... I think I know.  :)  Hopefully, I understand the question right.

Rather than  use the Full Xsheet (i.e. Xsheet Room/tab) you want to use the Xsheet windows that appears via Windows / Xsheet on the top menu.  This opens the xsheet undocked and you can place the xsheet anywhere you like and move things into and out of any column you want from the level strip.

This might not be quite what you want but... no views change position when the xsheet is undocked in its own window like this:

[Herbert123]

Thank you for the suggestion, but I am already working with a custom animation room, and I have a three screen setup, with one screen pivoted in portrait - which is the one I use for the Xsheet window.

Your screenshot actually demonstrates the problem: dragging a frame from the level strip into the Xsheet switches the viewport (combo viewer) content to that single level strip frame. The scene itself (the context) is blended out.

This is useful behaviour when one works on specific drawings in the level strip, but it would be nice if an option were available to keep the scene view displayed while dragging drawings from the level strip into the Xsheet.

With rigged characters this poses less of a problem, since a slider is blended into the view which allows for quick drag and select of level strip drawings - not visually, though, just by name. But in other circumstances it is quite distracting.

[Rodney Baker]

I'll have to stare at this further because I don't use the Combo Viewer often (and I should!).  Initially it wasn't showing what I wanted so I (mostly) left off using it.

That seems to be the major difference between why you see changes occurring where I don't.

The two parts of your post that I don't currently follow are:

1) drag a frame from the level strip into the xsheet switches the viewport content...

In my case nothing changes but that's probably because I'm not using the Combo Viewer.

I do think that undocked xsheets are important here because docked xsheets do produce changes whereas undocked xsheets do not (I'll have to check that out as time allows too)

2) If an option were available to keep the scene view displayed while dragging drawings from the level strip into the xsheet;;.

Here again, I'm successfully dragging and dropping drawings from the level strip into the xsheet and nothing is changing in the viewer (so I'm obviously not seeing the same thing you are).

Having said all this, I'm confident you know what you are seeing so the developers can address the issue.

In the first case it appears to be related to Combo Viewer while in the second (as possibly as in the first) it relates more to the xsheet).

My apologies if my attempt to look into the issue causes any confusion.

Yout workings are at a much higher level than mine and I'm still just scratching at the surface.

[Herbert123]

I think I have to make myself clear how this works (or rather does not work). :-)

1) you have scene with multiple elements. Foreground, background, character.
2) the foreground and background are exposed in the Xsheet downward for the entire length of the animation.
3) the character's level consists of several drawings.

Now, suppose we need to replace the second frame of our character column with the third drawing in the level strip. To do so, we hold down ALT, and then start dragging that third drawing in the level strip to the second frame of the character column.

Result: only the contents of the dragged level strip drawing is displayed. This is expected behaviour, since we clicked (dragged) a level strip drawing, and when we do so, the other parts (Xsheet) are blended out.

But in this case I would want to be able to drag drawings quickly in the Xsheet without the constant switching in the viewport.

Does this clarify it more? It is not that much of a problem - more of an annoyance. It requires an additional click on the frame in the Xsheet to display the entire scene once more.

[Juls_3000]

You know what means Blurymimd with "the handicapped curves function editor" ?

[Rodney Baker]

I believe I'm experiencing what you were talking about before but what is frustrating is that I wasn't seeing/experiencing that before.

Before I returned from work, read your latest post and went in to test I was able to drag/drop from the level strip into the xsheet without the view changing.

Now... it changes.every time I select a frame in the level strip.  What???

And I'm not sure what I changed that might be causing the difference.

I so do wish I had screen captured what I was doing before.

I think I need to reset my rooms/windows back to the default and try again from scratch.

[TurtleTooth]

I just submitted a pull request on GitHub for the ability to do drawing substitution  using the , and . keys.  This changes the current cell in the x sheet forward or backward one drawing.  This doesn't fully take care of your problem- the cells have to be in the xsheet already and you can't do multiple cells at the same time, but it works if you need to swap out drawings.

Demo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BW60JcFkYn0

[Rodney Baker]

That'll be a great addition Turtletooth and a timesaver too!

I suppose the question you may get is whether those shortcut keys will be hardwired or customizable.

[TurtleTooth]

Customizable all the way

[Herbert123]

That's great, thank you.