Need help finding software...
Printed From: Pixel Joint
Category: The Lounge
Forum Name: Resources and Support
Forum Discription: Help your fellow pixel artists out with links to good tutorials, other forums, software, fonts, etc. Bugs and support issues should go here as well.
URL: https://pixeljoint.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=17674
Printed Date: 10 September 2025 at 10:25pm
Topic: Need help finding software...
Posted By: AnthonyWhite
Subject: Need help finding software...
Date Posted: 21 December 2013 at 3:46pm
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-for animating pixel trees. I have been working with pixel art for a year or two now, and now that I am making and adding trees to a game that I play, I need to animate them.
This is one of my initial frames(out of many, many more to do): 
and I need it to do this: http://postimage.org/"> 
As you all can see, there are 12 frames in this animation. They are not blurring transitions, nor warp transitions. They merely move the pixels slightly around with each frame, and reshade a few, before returning to the original frame. The software I have tried so far(that doesn't do what I need) are: Paint.net Sqirlz Water Reflections (tried thinking outside the box here) FotoMorph GraphicsGale Aseprite (I also have Inkscape currently installed, but I don't know how it works, so I cannot evaluate it for what I need) I have been searching for 3 days now, and I figured you guys and gals might know where I could find software that isn't advertised on internet search engines. I would be forever in you guys and gals' debt, if you were to help me with this. . . . . . . . . . ...... I guess nobody knows any such programs. Thanks anyway, guys. |
Replies:
Posted By: Different55
Date Posted: 02 January 2014 at 5:43pm
| It'd be easier to find what you're looking for if you clearly describe what it is you want to do. If what you want is to move around a few pixels, you'd be able to get a nice effect by using something like MS Paint's selection tool to pick a branch to shift it a pixel or two. If you're hoping for something that will make the process a bit less tedious, I don't think there's much that can be done. |
Posted By: greenraven
Date Posted: 05 January 2014 at 9:28pm
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Seems to me like you're asking for a program to auto-animates for you? Yeah, that's not getting in the gallery any time soon. Sorry. If you just want a simple animation program, go with http://www.whitsoftdev.com/unfreez/ - unFreez . It's clean and simple enough and works well with MSpaint or whatever basic tools you're using. -------------  "pwnage comes with patience, practice and planning." ~ Jalonso 
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Posted By: AnthonyWhite
Date Posted: 07 January 2014 at 4:39pm
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I did specify exactly what I was asking. I said, that I was trying to find a program that could animate one frame(to make 12 frames out of), that varied from one to the next, to create the illusion of the trees moving in the wind.
I have no idea what you mean by being put "in the gallery", and I couldn't care less about that. I'm not here to show off any work, or enter into any contest. The program that you linked won't do what I need. I already have a program that I can make gifs out of, and I have one that can disassemble gifs, as well. What I need is one that will re-arrange certain pixels, and give me multiple, varying frames out of one frame. I cannot animate all of these frames myself, I would have hundreds to do. I guess I'm not going to find what I need here. Thanks anyways, guys. |
Posted By: torguen
Date Posted: 08 January 2014 at 2:36am
| First of all I did not know a program that does what you ask, what if I think is that the animated gif you uploaded is a 3D rendered animation, crafting similar results with pixelart would be very tedious. |
Posted By: yrizoud
Date Posted: 08 January 2014 at 8:16am
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I think the first animation was made using the "smear" tool. Maybe at a higher resolution and then reduced, so this gets this kind of sub-pixel animation. |
Posted By: neota
Date Posted: 08 January 2014 at 5:01pm
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I suggest looking into displacement maps and GIMP's 'Map->Displace' filter. They let you specify an offset for each pixel via gray level in the map(s). You can script the application of the filter using Python. This will allow you to vary the magnitude of the displacement between frames. ------------- absolutely. |
Posted By: AnthonyWhite
Date Posted: 08 January 2014 at 5:07pm
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Originally posted by yrizoud
I think the first animation was made using the "smear" tool. Maybe at a higher resolution and then reduced, so this gets this kind of sub-pixel animation. There is no "first animation". The first frame shown is just 1 frame. The gif below it is the only thing that is animated. The trees weren't smeared; they were originally 3d trees, shrunk down using the "nearest neighbor" method after using the magic wand tool, as any other method in Photoshop produces messy edges that need to be fixed for each frame. I work strictly with Photoshop. Any detail work I have to do, pixel-wise, is done in Photoshop. And, I realize that the trees aren't well defined. I was hoping that, after animating, the visual sloppiness wouldn't be so apparent. Which is the second reason why I wanted to animate them in the first place. |
Posted By: greenraven
Date Posted: 08 January 2014 at 8:38pm
Personally I think your attitude is a bit rude.  But you might wanna check http://www.effectgames.com/demos/canvascycle/ - this out then. Click the link below and it'll lead you to the download section. ------------- "pwnage comes with patience, practice and planning." ~ Jalonso
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Posted By: yrizoud
Date Posted: 09 January 2014 at 12:10am
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A smear tool with a lot of "hardness"(100% strength?) should be able to displace the group of pixel that's under the cursor, without smudging anything. But I don't know if Photoshop can use the tool this way. The alternative is 'select an area, cut and paste it one pixel to the side'. |
Posted By: neota
Date Posted: 09 January 2014 at 10:17pm
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^ GIMP can. Krita can too (distort-brush) I thought the OP's intent was to generate the frames, though, which is why I recommended Displace (you only need to make a displacement map and then you can apply it with different values to the first frame to get the different frames. ) ------------- absolutely. |
Posted By: yrizoud
Date Posted: 10 January 2014 at 5:31am
| You remind me there is the Photoshop tool "Clone". You can set it up to displace by one or two pixels in a direction. |
Posted By: AnthonyWhite
Date Posted: 18 January 2014 at 2:27pm
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Sorry, I was away for awhile on a trip. Thanks for the advice guys, I'll see if it helps.
@Greenraven: I don't see how I was the one being rude. Your "it's not going in the gallery anytime soon" comment sounded like you were the one who was actually rude. You might want to dial that back a bit, for future reference. I might have been curt, because I had thought I thoroughly explained myself in the initial post. I think there was just a simple misunderstanding, as I don't create Pixel Art from scratch(with the game I work with, it wouldn't look right anyway), but rather work with game art/cgi at the pixel level, in Photoshop. |