PlayAll problem in Project View Tab

[6eoff]

using..
Mac OS 10.7 (Lion)
TVPaint 'Standard' 10.0.3
not sure if 32 or 64bit)

When I go to project view via the project tab I can see all my clips but whatever I select I can't play them all in the timeline together.
After watching the tutorial I see that selecting a clip as shown below should not just let me view that clip but all clips.
What am I doing wrong?

[Paul Fierlinger]

You should be able to play them all in the order they are lined up, but the playback will stop wherever you have it marked to stop (Mark Out in project panel). If you have both the green and red marks in the same place, nothing will move. You most likely have this in one of your clips.

EDIT: I just noticed you have your looping turned on.

[Elodie]

You are using the Standard Edition : you cannot play your storyboard as an animatic, it's a Professional feature

(By the way, you should update your TVPaint to the version 10.0.14 )

[Paul Fierlinger]

Hmm... I never knew that. Elodie, is this because only TVP 10 is on the market now and what used to be the differences between 9 and 10 are now reflected between 10 Standard and 10 Pro?

[6eoff]

cannot play your storyboard as an animatic!? it's a Professional Feature!?

I can make my storyboard an ''animatic'' in one project but it will obviously get messy and difficult to use when it becomes too large.
I understand why you put the camera tools in a professional edition but playing a selection of clips? seriously?
If you're asking an extra 685€ for this feature, among the multiple other storyboarding tools, you have priced yourself way out of the market!

[Paul Fierlinger]

I just checked the price lists, and in all fairness, looking at the prices the other way around and first considering all the things you actually get for just 495 Euros, compared to what you get for 1180 Euros, I don't see anything unfair about the prices -- especially since you do acknowledge that there is a way for you to playback your storyboard panels. It's not as if you are completely crippled at the outset. This is a fairly new feature -- some of us here have made dozens and dozens of successful professional films without havening the benefit of even those three tabs; Project, Timeline, X-Sheet.

Looking even closer, I don't see anything in the Pro version that can't be done in the Standard one using some workarounds.

[Fabrice]

cannot play your storyboard as an animatic!? it's a Professional Feature!?

it's just much more than just playing the storyboard as an animatic.

the Professionnal Edition also allows to :
* use the 2 storyboard view with notes, action, dialog
* use the editing view
* use a global soundtrack
* be able to split the soundtrack into clips
* be able to adjust the lengh of each clip
* use the camera tool
* use a profile curve to be able to adjust the speed of the camera
* export the storyboard as a PDF file

[Paul Fierlinger]

6eoff,

I suggest you export your storyboard as individual uncompressed AVIs and import these clips into an NLE where you should begin your film's edit timeline. There you can stretch and shrink your clips with ease, match to a soundtrack, create dissolves etc. From there you can copy the portion of the soundtrack that covers each clip and import those into your TVP,s clips to start your animation. Keep updating your AVI's as your animation progresses so that any time you wish to see how your clips play together, you can go to your NLE for an overview -- re-edit, change soundtracks etc.

I just described to you my work flow which I use to this day. I always have both these software constantly opened and switch back and forth between them all day long. It is really better when working on a longer film anyway than to attempt to do this within the Project TAB.

There are some very cheap and good NLE's out there for under $100, which are perfectly sufficient for animators, since we do not use cameras, special effects, color corrections and all the cheesy stuff the expensive NLEs so love to push.

[ndstephens]

Thanks for sharing your workflow, Paul. I come from more of a film-making background and am used to NLE's. Wasn't sure if switching back and forth a lot was typical or seen as a distraction. I was planning on asking soon but you just answered it for me.

[Elodie]

Hmm... I never knew that. Elodie, is this because only TVP 10 is on the market now and what used to be the differences between 9 and 10 are now reflected between 10 Standard and 10 Pro?

All the features linked to the animatic didn't exist in TVPaint 9 either.

Here is what the Faq says about the differences between the Standard and Professional Edition. It was more or less the same list, we just added some new points (like being able to put protect layer groups with a password) :

What does the Professional Edition of TVPaint Animation have that the Standard Edition doesn't ?

● The Professional edition works in 32 and 64 bit platform (only 32 bit for Standard edition) and also works on Linux
● You may protect the access to some layers with a password
● Load multiple soundtracks. Standard allows only one sound track.
● Layer Blending Modes (such as Multiply/Dodge/Erase/Burn/etc.)
● More special effects than the Standard Edition (which include greenscreen/bluescreen keyers, transitions, rendering and distortion effects)
● A "Rooms" interface that allows the user to rapidly swap between 4 palette and window layouts
● The ability to view storyboards as animatics
● A camera tool to facilitate making Animatics from storyboards
● Global sounds can be applied in the main Project view, which can then span over multiple Clips.
● A Storyboard tab where you can annotate clips with notes, actions and dialog
● Several view modes available in the Storyboard tab
● Stretching easily the Clip's duration
● Exporting your storyboard as a PDF or HTML file, with many customizable parameters
● An Xsheet tab for lipsynch with limited animation
● The "healing" painting mode
● Interface with high speed video capture/output cards (like BlackMagic cards)
● ...

This is only a partial list of the features that can only be found in the Professional Edition!
See the comparison file for the full list.