Express Animator

Infobox Software
name = Express Animator
caption = Express Animator screenshot


latest_release_version = Express Animator (1.0)
latest_release_date = Dec 1 2007
operating_system = Windows
genre = Animation Creator
license = Proprietary EULA
website = [http://www.expressanimator.com Express Animator home page]

Express Animator is a software program for making animations, primarily Flash animations for websites. [cite web |url=http://www.expressanimator.com|title=Description of Express Animator] It is similar to Adobe's Flash MX software but has additional features such as skeletal animation and exporting to Silverlight format while lacking advanced features such as advanced scripting. It is of the genre of vector based graphics programs in that it stores the coordinates of the shapes vertices. The shapes are filled with either colours, gradients, or bitmaps.

Skeletal Animation

Express Animator features skeletal animation which is a way of linking together shapes such as arms or legs so that can be animated like a puppet. This allows the user to create moveable characters.

Tweening

The primary method of animation is that of tweening. This means that the user specifies the position, orientation and colour of the first and last frames of an animation and the computer fills in all the intermediate positions. [cite web |url=http://www.w3schools.com/flash/flash_tweening.asp|title=W3 desription of tweening]

Morphing

Express Animator features morphing (also called shape tweening) which allows the user to animate smooth transformations between two shapes.

Javascript Interfacing

Although Express Animator does not implement the full ActionScript it is possible to make games with Express Animator using Javascript interfacing. This is a similar method to the way Silverlight implements interactions. This means that the user gives a reference name to each MovieClip in a frame. Then the user can interface with the objects in javascript. For example the following takes the position of a MovieClip with reference object1 and adds 20 to it:

var x= SWFobject.TGetProperty("_root.object1",0);

SWFobject.SetVariable("_root.object1._x",x+20);

Where SWFobject is the javascript DOM object which represents the embedded SWF.

Import and Export Formats

Express Animator imports and exports media files in several formats to various extents. The main ones are:

cripting

Express Animator has a point and click scripting environment which is limited to basic actions useful for simple animations such as hyperlinks, frame navigation and button events. More complicated actions must be implemented via Javascript interfacing. For example to call a javascript funtion myfunction from a button the user would add the following action using the menus:

GetURL("javascript:myfunction()");

See also

* Flash animation
* Silverlight
* Scalar Vector Graphics
* PDF
* Skeletal Animation
* KoolMoves
* Toufee
* Anime Studio

References