Hi. I’m currently creating the different mouth drawings for the lip-synch of my puppet and I was curious: does it make a difference if I draw the lips on different drawings of the same cell, or is it preferred that I put each drawing on its own cell. Will one cause me problems in the future over the other one?
Also, what is the recommendation for different styles of mouth on the same character… for instance, a happy mouth with happy lip synch mouth shapes, a sad mouth with sad lip synch mouth shapes, etc. Should I do these on separate layers, and turn whichever one off when I’m not using it (as they would have the same drawing names ‘x, a, b, etc’ for each type of mouth)?
Hi. The lip sync mouths positions need be created in the same drawing element (layer), as drawings cells currently named A-B-C-D-E-F-G-X.
This layer can be selected later, for assign the automated lip sync, know as map lip sync, and this, swaps the mouth positions in the drawing element, or layer, for syncronize with the audio track (with the automated lip sync already done.)
If you use different layers per each mouth position, the automated lip sync is not possible.
The styles, can be draw each in its own layer (all happy mouths in one layer drawing, all sad positions in other layer) and then select the audio portions that needs happy or sad mouths and assign to his proper layer. You can assign a blank cell all time when the layer should be not visible, as eg.
Also, if you prefer, you can finally copy in one new mouth layer all moods, selecting and copying the exposed swapped segments and paste each ones with paste special, always create drawings, to cover the style variations in the same layer, just in the time when the original swapping was done in each mouth layer, for simplify the timeline.
May have also others procedures that can be discussed here. I hope I have been clear. Good Luck.
Yoryo
Thanks, but I think you misunderstood my question. I was not asking if I would store each drawing (A-B-C etc) in its own layer, what I meant was would it be better if each drawing in my puppet template resided in a different frame on the mouth layer (drawing A on frame 1, drawing B on frame 2, drawing C on frame 3, etc) or would it be ok if each drawing is on the same frame (ie drawings A-X all living on frame 1 and being swapped out from there?
Is one preferable to the other? Would they both function the same or does one option have draw backs that make the other one more efficient?
As I can understand, the drawing-frame concept is a node in this discussion. Each drawing, in a drawing layer can be swapped in each frame as you need. Drawing A is not fixed in frame 1, drawing B in frame 2 and so on, drawing A in the cell 1, drawing B is in the cell 2 and so on, all layer drawing content can be swapped in each frame. You can done A to X in the same frame, and do the same in the next frame and so.
When you are drawing you are using different cells for each drawing, but this doesn´t involve the frame concept. In each frame you can swap all cells as you are in the drawing layer. I´m sorry if I can´t understood, but I can explain you the general concept of cell, drawing and frame. I´m sure that Lilly can finally answer his question as you need.
Yoryo
I did a little lip sync tutorial on my youtube channel 
you can do them all on the same layer and when you choose to map it gives you an option to choose which drawings to use instead of having to use the default frame.
Like Yoryo said you can draw them all on the first frame so long as you are using a new drawing for each one. Drawings aren’t tied to a frame. This can definitly be useful when your character has multiple views.
Hi Lilly. I was pretty sure I got it, but actually, what you said here sealed it up for me, as that was what I was doing anyway: drawing on consecutive cells, then deleting the cells and accessing the extra drawings from one cell. I just wasn’t sure if there was a pro or con to one of the ways working over the other.
But, here’s two more questions… along the same line:
1. On my following poses, my 3/4 and side views will also use mouth shapes that will have to have the same drawing names if I switch to that pose and want to continue the lip synch. Now, I’m pretty sure this is not allowed, as it would confuse the computer since it would not know which ‘a’ mouth shape you want with which pose, etc. How do you suggest solving this?
2. Also having to do with the extra poses, how do you set the pivots for the extra poses on the same ‘peg’ layer. In other words, my ‘head’ peg contains all of my head drawings so they rotate together, so I set my pivot for the head on that peg. However, when I switch to 3/4 and side view, I want to set the peg in a different place because obviously in those different poses you would want the head rotation to be centered around a different location. But if I reset the pivot for that pose then it moves it for my initial pose. So, is there a way to set the pivot on the same peg at a different place for each pose? If not, how is this accomplished?
Thanks!
Was what everyone said there clear?
The way that the swapping works is it takes each drawing and allows you to swap between them. So if you create a drawing on cell 1, and then you want to create a NEW drawing on cell 1, then make sure you right-click that cell and select Drawings > Duplicate Drawings (there’s also a button for this in your timeline toolbar).
What I usually do is I draw all of the drawings on separate cells, then right away after I draw them I go back and delete the exposure. As you can tell in the drawing swapper in the library, as soon as you draw something it’s automatically saved in the drawing swapper (but saving the scene just to make sure is never a bad idea).
~Lilly
It depends on how you’re working with your different poses. Do you have all of your poses in one master template, or do you have your poses broken up into several different templates?
When it comes to lip sync, you’re right that it can only sync to one set of mouths at a time. Also, there is no way to select a frame range for your mapping, so it will map to that whole layer and overwrite any previous mapping you may have done.
I would suggest having two different mouth layers, one that’s a duplicate of the other. One will be your final layer, and the other can be a temporary layer that you use for auto lip-sync. If you have more than one set of mouths on the same layer, then just make sure they’re named A-front, A-side, A-3-4, etc. and then map to that set in your temporary layer. You can calculate the lip sync only once for the scene, then map it to the first set of mouth shapes that you’re interested in on your temporary layer. Then copy and paste this result into your final mouth layer for the frame range you’re interested in.
Then you can go back and do the mapping for the second set of mouths, and then copy and paste these frames in to your final layer. As long as the two layers have the same drawing, by doing a copy and paste all you’re doing is copying and pasting the EXPOSURE of the drawings, so it should work out just fine.
Regarding the pivots, what kind of a hierarchy are you working with? Are you using all pegs?
Usually what we recommend is that you use an option in your drawing layer that will tell the parent peg to inherit the pivot from the drawing. What this means is that on your drawing layer, you will use the pivot tool to set the pivots on each different head. Then double-click on the head layer. Are you in Animate Pro? This only works in Animate Pro. In the Layer Properties of the drawing layer, in the Drawing tab, for “Use Embedded Pivots” select “Apply Embedded Pivot on Parent Peg”.
There’s also a script for this available in the Scripting toolbar if you need to set this on many different elements. Simply select all of your drawing layers in the network view and then in the scripting toolbar push the TB_Enable_Drawing_Pivot script button.
Now if you have a peg attached to your drawing layer, it will take its pivot point from the drawings.
Hope this helps!
~Lilly