Cel Animation

This video is part of the official comprehensive video course about Duik Ángela

The Cel Animation* tool is used in conjunction with After Effects’ paint effect to create traditional hand drawn animations.

Still from Little Nemo,
Winsor McCay, 1911
Public domain.

This tool creates celluloids which will receive animations. By default, a new celluloid is a new solid layer with a paint effect, but if you [Alt] + [Click] the , the new celluloid is added on the selected layer.

After creating a new celluloid, you can use a brush to draw each frame of the animation with the After Effects paint effect.

The tool can add an onion skin, automatically adjusting the duration of the brush strokes, using the exposure set in the field between the next and previous frame buttons.

• The onion skin’s duration (in frames) can be set next to the box used to activate it.

• The In Opacity and Out Opacity define on which side the onion skin is applied, and the value of the first frame of the onion skin’s opacity.

• The animation exposure is set at the bottom, and it is advised to always use the next and previous frame buttons from Duik to navigate in the time of the composition; this way Duik can automatically adjust the duration of the brush strokes.
  This value can be changed whenever you want.
  It is still possible to manually adjust the duration of the brushstrokes, then Duik will not change it, but will still add the onion skin when needed.