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CreativityTranscript
00:00What if I told you that you can easily create cartoon animations
00:03using only CapCut and an image editor and no other software?
00:07In this guide, we're going to go through the process step by step
00:11to create an animation from vectors so that you can start making your own.
00:15And you'll find the link of the animation in the description down below.
00:18Okay, so as promised, here is the method to do it.
00:21A four-step process that may look complex at first,
00:24but can become very easy with some practice.
00:27To start with a broad description, first stage will always
00:30be a fusion between a growing idea and research for vectors.
00:34The combination between these two is what will give you your storyboard,
00:38just like in Hollywood movies,
00:40where you need to plan ahead of time your story and needed assets.
00:43And that is a crucial element for the next stage, frame creation.
00:48Here, we'll create all image frames that we will need for our storyboard,
00:52characters, backgrounds, and elements.
00:55And once we have our frames, we can go edit them in CapCut for the final result.
00:59Now, you may be saying to yourself,
01:01is he crazy? Is this the tip, animating frame by frame?
01:05But bear with me here, it's easier than it sounds,
01:08and things will clear up as we go along in the guide.
01:10Okay, let's get into it.
01:12So obviously, the start of the journey is a draft of an animation idea.
01:16At this stage, you only lay out the main ideas,
01:18as their execution will depend on the vectors that you find online.
01:22So my story is about a guy camping in nature,
01:25and being annoyed by a mosquito.
01:27And yes, don't take my story too seriously.
01:29At this point, I don't really have a clear idea on how the animation will look visually.
01:34So I start by looking at the available vectors,
01:36and fine-tune my scenario.
01:38There's going to be two categories of assets that you'll be looking for,
01:41backgrounds and characters.
01:42The characters is going to be the hardest part,
01:45because you need to find assets that you can easily animate.
01:48For this, I suggest you add the following keyword in your search,
01:52sprites or sprite sheets.
01:53This will give you assets that are already pre-animated.
01:57Once you find a style that you like,
01:59you can go to the author's page and search for other similar assets.
02:02There is, for example, this artist,
02:04that has lots of characters with a similar design
02:07that would go very well in a 2D game, for example.
02:10But the one I liked is this one.
02:12This artist not only has pre-animated characters,
02:15also different face expressions.
02:17Don't worry, I'll show you how to use them.
02:19So I went for this character.
02:20And hopefully, get everything we need out of this sheet.
02:23I also did the same thing with the mosquito,
02:25and settled with this sprite sheet.
02:28A good-looking mosquito that has all the positions we need for the animation.
02:32Okay, now that we've identified our characters,
02:35we go and search for backgrounds and sceneries.
02:37And this is actually rather easy, as there are plenty of assets online.
02:40Your main challenge, though,
02:41will be to gather sceneries with the same feel and touch.
02:45For this, using assets from the same artist is a good way,
02:48but it won't give you everything.
02:49You really need to spend the time and browse through the tons of assets,
02:53mix up your search keywords,
02:54to end up with a set of images that go along well.
02:57For my animation, I gathered these sceneries.
03:00The camping base at day.
03:02I was lucky to find the exact same one at night time.
03:05And some other backgrounds and elements for various scenes.
03:08Now we can say that our storyboard is a bit more clear.
03:12The different assets that we gathered help us fine-tune our animation idea.
03:16And now, we can fully imagine our story
03:19with every single item and frame that we will need.
03:22And here is where it gets interesting.
03:24You could choose to use these backgrounds directly in JPG format,
03:28and you would not need to do any further thing on it,
03:31and you could use it directly in CapCut.
03:33But you could also choose to get them in vector format
03:36and tweak them a little bit.
03:37Let me show you how.
03:39So, the reason we want to go with vectors
03:41is to be able to layer our images.
03:44This way, we can create parallax animations with our backgrounds.
03:47We can also make elements or characters appear behind objects,
03:51which is always better.
03:52And we can isolate or remove some objects to adapt the image to our wishes.
03:56So, let's see how it works in this background.
03:59The camp at night.
04:00This one has a lot of things going on.
04:02That's why I choose it for my example.
04:04I will be showing you how to do it in Adobe Illustrator and in Photopea.
04:09And I will slow down a bit.
04:11This is a critical step.
04:12So I got my vector over here.
04:14And first thing you always want to do is go for Layer Discovery.
04:18In Illustrator, it will highlight the objects your mouse is on.
04:21Start by moving objects around.
04:23See which ones are grouped or in the same layers.
04:26Right-click and ungroup or release the mask if needed.
04:29Once you can properly select the wanted objects,
04:31put them aside from each other like this.
04:34And let's bring our adjustments.
04:36So, for the background, I need to tweak the sky
04:38to be able to do a vertical parallax animation.
04:41To do that, I simply resize the rectangle
04:44and duplicate some clouds and stars.
04:46I also like this moon from another vector.
04:49So I select it and copy-paste it to my scene.
04:51Place it and size it accordingly.
04:53And there is my background.
04:55Now, for the camp, I want to get rid of this fire
04:57as I'm going to be adding my animated fire.
04:59So I select it along all the little objects around it and delete them.
05:03I also need this tent to be in a separate image
05:06to be able to animate it in my final scene.
05:08So I also select it and put it aside.
05:11Now I simply export each group into a separate PNG file.
05:15On Photopea, it works in a similar way,
05:17except that you'll have to find the layers on the right panel.
05:20Play around with the eye icon to locate the wanted objects.
05:24Once you locate it, simply deactivate all the other ones
05:28to isolate the wanted elements.
05:30And export your file to PNG format.
05:32And do the same for all the other objects.
05:34Another way to do it is with mouse selection.
05:36It will, however, select unwanted objects.
05:39And you'll have to retry multiple times to get the right selection.
05:42Now, it's a lot more comfortable in Illustrator,
05:44but not everyone has it.
05:46So here is the free option with Photopea.
05:49So you do this on all your backgrounds.
05:50When you're done, organize them in proper folders.
05:53And we can move along to the character frames.
05:56Now the character animation works in a similar way to old-school cinematography.
06:01A film roll is composed of a number of frames per second.
06:04And when put together, images become animated.
06:08Us humans can see up to 60 frames per second.
06:11The first movies ever made were up to 24 frames per second.
06:15But for our animation, we can go with less.
06:17So we'll break down every movement that we want into a series of frames or images.
06:22Let's take the big one, the hiker.
06:24For him running, for example, I can already take the ones that are ready.
06:27And we can add a couple of frames just to make it a bit better.
06:31We can duplicate and reuse the legs or the arms
06:34by rotating them to create complementary frames.
06:37Just be careful with selecting the right objects.
06:40Putting each important asset into a group is a good way to go.
06:43The arms, the legs, the head, and so on.
06:46To complete the running cycle, we just retake the previous ones
06:49and put them in reverse order.
06:51Now we have eight frames for running.
06:54For the character sitting, we take the one that is already there.
06:57We can tweak the face expressions using the available assets.
07:01So we can make him grumpy with the mouth and the eyebrows.
07:05Simply interchange them as you wish and create sequences of frames.
07:10Same thing for him fighting.
07:11Just these two frames will be enough.
07:13And him sleeping.
07:15We choose the right preset and adapt the face expressions willingly.
07:19After we're done, we export each asset in a separate PNG file
07:23and make sure to name them properly.
07:25It's very important for the next steps in CapCut.
07:28We can also animate this windmill by simply rotating
07:31and creating a couple of frames with incremented rotation.
07:35By putting the frames together, you get a rotating windmill.
07:39You can also tweak the vectors.
07:41For example, this toilet paper.
07:43To animate it like it shrinks from the rain,
07:45simply select the anchor points and play with them a little.
07:49Create a series of frames this way to animate it.
07:52And if you really want to, you can also animate the wings of the flying mosquito
07:57by simply rotating the wings and creating sequences of frames.
08:01We do the same for all the assets that we want to animate.
08:04Prepare sequences of frames.
08:06And by the end, you have a collection of images of all your animated characters.
08:11And we can move on to the next step.
08:13The final stage will be in CapCut.
08:15And really, we already did the hard part.
08:18So for CapCut, I'm going to start by showing you the general principles.
08:21Then some practical applications on your video edit.
08:23When you get into CapCut, you want to have your assets organized in folders like this.
08:28I have a folder for each character with folders of each type of movement.
08:31Inside it, I have my frames with numbers on the file name
08:35indicating the position of the frame.
08:37And all my assets are organized in the same way.
08:39Characters and backgrounds.
08:41So let's say I want to animate this singing mosquito.
08:44First thing to do is set the default media length to 0.1 seconds.
08:49That will give us 10 frames per second, which is not too bad.
08:52Then we simply drag our elements one after the other and place them on the timeline.
08:58And you test.
08:59You'll often find that some frames are not perfectly aligned, creating this sort of glitch.
09:04So in this case, you take the frame and you put it above the previous one.
09:08And you try to superimpose them.
09:10Play on the scale and position to align key elements of the body.
09:13In this example, the eyes.
09:15Every frame should be superimposed to the previous one.
09:18When you're done, simply duplicate them and make as much as you can.
09:22Because we might be speeding up the compound clip.
09:25And we can trim it, but not extend it.
09:27So the more you duplicate, the more flexibility you will have.
09:31When you're done, create a compound clip and test it out.
09:34You can increase the speed if you want a better movement.
09:37Once you're satisfied, put it aside.
09:39Let's now do the man running.
09:41We use the same principle.
09:43Put the frames in sequences, test them out, superimpose the ones that are not,
09:47duplicate as much as you can, and create a compound clip.
09:51We can do the same with the campfire.
09:54Duplicate the frames and create a compound clip.
09:57Also with the toilet paper, I just took a couple of frames for this one,
10:01as we're gonna be rotating them later.
10:03Okay, let's move to the backgrounds and let's take the farm scene.
10:07Remember that windmill that we rotated?
10:10Well, here it is.
10:12Simply bring the frames and duplicate.
10:15Then create a compound clip and speed it up.
10:18We bring our foreground and place and scale everything.
10:21Now, we bring our character and put him between the layers.
10:24To do that, simply go to the right panel and select a layer in between.
10:28In this example, layer number two.
10:31Bring the toilet paper in the same way.
10:33Now, to animate them, we'll just use keyframes.
10:36For the man, set a start position and an end position.
10:40Same thing for the toilet paper roll,
10:43except that we'll be rotating it in the middle of its path.
10:46Just a small rotation after another using keyframes.
10:49Test it out and adapt the speed of the movement
10:51by bringing the little diamond to the left or to the right.
10:54And really, that's it.
10:56But I'll also show you some cool stuff you can use in your edit.
11:00Number one, the parallax movement.
11:03Very simple.
11:04Place your scene in its final position.
11:07We put the back, the front, the tent, and the fireplace.
11:10Then set a keyframe on every element at the beginning.
11:14Then you go to the end of the scene and you set a keyframe again on every element.
11:19The key in parallax is the following.
11:22You need to create a difference in the scale and distance of both elements.
11:26The front and the back.
11:28If the foreground scales 150% and goes down 1000 pixels,
11:33your background should scale to 250% and go up 3000 pixels, for example.
11:38So we do exactly that.
11:40The front goes down just a bit and scales a bit.
11:43The back goes up a lot and scales a lot.
11:45But the key here, as I told you in the other tutorials,
11:48is to use the keyframe animations.
11:51Open it for every element and use, for example, Ease Out 3.
11:55Do this for every element.
11:56Otherwise, it will create some bad-looking results.
11:59Another thing you can do is use the shake effect on the tent to create a sense of fighting.
12:04You can also add this cartoon effect called energy to make a turbulent tent.
12:10Let's go to where the mosquito sings.
12:12We can use a filter in the mono category called BW3.
12:16You can split your scene and apply it to the second one to create a sense of lights going out.
12:21You can also reduce the luma curve to make it even darker.
12:25And I import this spotlight that I got from a vector.
12:28I simply place it and select the right blend mode, Darken.
12:32Use keyframes on the rotation to create a sense of a moving spotlight.
12:37And do the same thing for the shadow, which is a separate image.
12:41And there is your night scene.
12:42And really, when you look at my timeline,
12:44it's really a combination of what I just told you.
12:47My timeline is basically composed of lots of compound clips stacked with keyframes.
12:52And here is the scene we were just talking about.
12:54As you can see, it's just those element stacked and keyframe.
12:58You can always fancy it with extra effects or filters.
13:02For example, here I used a filter for daytime,
13:05a filter for the rain scene,
13:06and another one for the night scene.
13:08Another key of this animation, however, is sound effects.
13:12They take as much space as my other assets.
13:14For the music, you can simply use the vocal and music isolation
13:18and have them in separate tracks.
13:21For the singing, I just applied the voice changer, High.
13:24And Gloria becomes a mosquito.
13:27As I said in my previous videos, the place to get them is Pixabay.
13:31I used here a lot of male expressions, male exclamations,
13:34laughing sounds, rain sounds, mosquito sounds.
13:37Here they are, if you want to get their names.
13:39I didn't have 90% of them when I started editing this animation.
13:43I just got them from Pixabay along the way, as I needed them.
13:46I guess that's also a way to do it.
13:48Well guys, I hope this guide will let you unleash your creativity.
13:51If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section.
13:54And if you liked it, hit that subscribe button for more content.
13:57Until next time, cheers.