Ghetto Importing Images to Layer
I would like to gush for a moment, if you don't mind...
I absolutely love this app. By far my favorite animation software. I started using it to prototype animations, export it and clean it up in other software. I had been using flash pro 4 before switching primarily to flipaclip. One can argue that flash is a way more powerful software, jam packed full of features blah blah. One can also argue that what I had been using is old etc. I do lowish resolution animations, with small color pallets, using pretty much only a solid round brush and a sketchy brush shape for cloudy shading or color blending. So flipaclip has that covered and my minimal requirements make the features of flash pro more of an obstacle than anything.
I've checked this forum pretty frequently for the last two or so years that I've been using flipaclip, really only looking for one thing; Has someone found a way to import an image to a layer?!
That, for me, has been my only hope for this app. Sure some new brushes would be cool. I'd certainly make use of layer opacity or forward onion skinning, but really, importing drawings is more a need than a want for me.
I've always imported a base character that I plan to animate as a background image and traced it on a layer. This is a pretty annoying process, to say the least, however, in doing this it has proven to save a lot of time in the long run.
Okay, I'm going to make what may very well be my first attempt at contributing knowledge to the internet. However, I should note that this could mess things up if... Ya know, you mess this up. I just discovered this a few hours before writing this and I haven't experimented with the what ifs, I pretty much ran straight here.
THE HOW TO
Firstly, all imported images must be png and of a resolution 854 x 480
(I have no idea what will happen if you try a different size)
You will need to find your project files and make note of or a short cut to that location.
Android > data > com.vblast.flipaclip > files > projects
The projects files go by what looks like order of creation, not by project name or anything, so if you have hundreds of projects like me, this can get complicated...
In this directory, we'll see folders like p1, p2, p3 etc so that's all good to know, I guess.
Open flipaclip and create a new project.
Now you'll want to create the number of frames and layers you plan to import.
With layers, you have to at least scribble on the layer and frames, so it saves the image in that directory we discovered.
Once you have your frames and layers (complete with scribbles), go ahead and close flipaclip.
I should note that I closed it completely, with that handy-dandy tabs button every time.
With that done, go back to that folder where the projects are and look for the highest numbered project folder (eg. p14)
In that folder we'll see a bg.png and some more numbered folders, beginning with L this time. There will be the same amount of folders as there are layers in the project, however they are numbered by the order of creation, not by project so you'll need to make note of which folder is what layer.
In these folders, there are numbered png images.
You need to rename the images you want to import to the numbers of the images in this layer folder. (Eg 13.png)
These are again numbered by creation, not animation sequence.
Once you have all the images you plan to import renamed to the ones in the layer folder, go ahead and delete all the images in that folder.
Then move all the renamed images in.
Now you can launch flipaclip and open your project with the imported images on the layer!
It may take some reordering with the stage view to get the sequence right, but at least it's there!
As the title implies, this is ghetto but I for one am stoked about this discovery and so I thought I'd share it in case someone else desperately needs this capability.
