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Moho & Magpie ProGetting your animation moving and in syncBy Peter BohushTwo interesting products can aid professional and aspiring 2D animators in creating the next Arthur or at least Beavis and Butthead cartoons. Moho and Magpie Pro are separate applications that can be used in conjunction with each other for complete animation and lip syncing design and control. MohoMoho, $99 from Lost Marble, is a 2D spline-based cartooning program, with layered vector graphics creation, bone construction and keyframe-based animation. The best way I can describe it is somewhere between Flash/LiveMotion and Kai’s PowerGoo. If that doesn’t confuse you, you’ve got what it takes to master animation with Moho. Vector art can be imported from Illustrator, or created within Moho with its limited drawing tools. Unlimited numbers of handles can be added to any lines or shapes, and used to manipulate the shapes in the animations. A nice timeline shows every frame. Keyframes can be added at any point in the timeline, and the graphic shapes can be changed to create the animation. Moho creates any needed frames between the keyframes to achieve smooth animation (this is known as tweening.) Useful for creating animations in the styles of The Flintstones or Angela Anaconda, or for drawing components for animation cells, Moho has a shallower learning curve than an Adobe After Effects or high-end animation program such as Maya or USAnimation. Yet the low price of Moho can be deceiving. It’s a complex application, well-thought and versatile. The “bones” section of Moho offers an interesting perspective on item grouping. Connect several layers of objects together – for example, the parts of an arm with hand – and they can be moved as a group in the animation track. This can be a real timesaver. Moho is available in Windows flavors and for Mac OS and OSX. Magpie ProMagpie Pro, $250 from Third Wish Software, is a great lip syncing tool geared toward the professional animator. In use by dozens of top animation firms, Magpie pro does one thing, and does it well. There are many animation programs on the market, but few can provide the lip syncing capabilities needed to create believable cartoon dialogue. Magpie Pro not only does it, but makes it easy. First, the images must be created with various mouth poses. This can be done in Illustrator or any image editing or drawing program that can create bitmap (BMP) images. These are added to an expressions library. Import an audio file to sync to and view the waveform in the timeline or in a vertical “exposure sheet.” By simply clicking on the various bitmap images at the appropriate frames in the audio timeline, you create a perfectly synced animation. But Magpie can animate more than just mouths. Other columns or expression sets can be added for eyes opening and closing or other animation movements. Magpie exports QuickTime, Flash 5 and into formats for Lightwave, Maya, 3D Studio Max and Softimage 3D. It comes with an extensive bundle of sample images and a detailed tutorial. SummaryIf you’d like to become a professional animator, you’ll need experience in one or more of the high-end products mentioned above. But you’ll also benefit from using Moho and Magpie Pro, and may even find these as your professional tools of choice. Amateur animators can afford to try both products, and both are also extremely useful for web animation, especially for Flash or Shockwave animations. -30- Peter Bohush created the comic strip “Booger,” and has done voice-overs for children’s television shows and web animations. His forthcoming book, “The Cheapskate’s Guide to Digital Moviemaking,” will be available soon at www.Writerdirector.com.
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WriterDirector.com
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