Drawing tools

Main tools

• Pen

  You can draw when this tool is active. See also the Pen properties section.

• Color picker

  When active, clicking on the drawing area will set the pen color to the color of the pixel under the cursor. Note that after clicking, you can keep the button pressed and then moving around the drawing will keep the picked color updated until you release the button. After releasing the button, the pen tool is automatically selected.

• Symmetry center editor

  See the Symmetry centers properties section on how to use the symmetry center editor.

• Pan/move

  See the Pan/move properties section on how to use the pan/move tool.

Undo

Click on the undo button to undo the last stroke that you have drawn on the active layer.

Pen properties

• pen color

• pen texture

  There is an opaque brush, others with increasingly sparse textures and some extra brushes.

• pen size

  Drag this to change the size/thickness of the pen.

• size dependence

  You can switch between constant size and variable size. When you set constant size, the size of your pen will remain constant. When you set variable size, the size of your pen will change over time, depending on how fast you draw. It can also depend on the pressure you apply to the pen, if you have a capable device then you can turn on this pressure sensitive mode in Top Menu/Settings/Pressure sensitivity.

• "force goto next frame" modes

  Change if drawing forces going to next frame even when the layer is paused and if this erases next frame. You have the following options:

  • normal Usual drawing mode, no tricks.

  • next The layer is playing while you are drawing, use this mode on a paused layer to have an effect.

    Use case: Drawing on a paused finite or infinite layer in this mode is ideal for creating whiteboard animations.

  • next+erase When drawing, the frame you are drawing on is erased beforehand (this cannot be undone so be careful with this mode). The layer is playing while you are drawing (even on a paused layer).

    Use case: Drawing in this mode on a loop layer will erase your drawing made in the previous loop, thus imitating drawing with water on paper.

Pan/move properties

• pan/move target

  You can select what to pan/move or zoom/scale:

  • view In this mode you can drag and pan the stage with the mouse or tablet pen or drag and zoom the stage with right mouse button or tablet pen button.

  • camera
    In this mode you can drag and pan the camera with the mouse or tablet pen or drag and zoom the camera with right mouse button or tablet pen button. This changes what is currently shown on the projection window or when exporting images.

• reset position/scale Reset to default the pan/move or zoom/scale setting of the current target (view or camera).

Background properties

• background color
• canvas image on/off
• canvas opacity

Quick Color Palette

Click on a slot in the quick color palette to set the pen color to this color. Right-click on a slot to change the color in that slot. You can also drag and drop a color slot on another (including the pen and background color).

FX properties

Set an FX that alters the final composite of the canvas and the layers.

• turn FX on/off
• choose FX type
• change FX resolution

Symmetry centers properties

• turn symmetries on/off
• reflectional (horizontal/vertical) symmetry
• rotational symmetry
• always show symmetry centers (even when the symmetry center editor tool is not active) on/off

Main symmetry center

When the symmetry center editor tool is active, you can modify symmetry centers. By default the main symmetry center (its sign is a big diamond-like shape) is in the middle of the drawing area. Reflections and rotations are computed with respect to the main symmetry center. Clicking on the symmetry centers recenter button resets the position of the main symmetry center to the middle of the drawing area (see later for moving it around the drawing area).

The reflection switch and the rotation switch set the symmetries that are applied to the stroke you are drawing.

The reflection switch can be set into three modes:

• no reflection
• horizontal reflection
• vertical reflection

No reflection means no reflection, while in horizontal and vertical reflection mode what you draw is also mirrored on the respective axis going through the main symmetry center.

The rotation switch sets the number of rotational copies:

Setting it to x rotational copies (where x can be 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 16 or 32) will draw x rotated copies of what you draw, evenly distributed around the main symmetry center.

Combining reflections and rotational symmetries gives you a wide range of possibilities to easily achieve stunning animated mandalas/kaleidoscopes.

Secondary symmetry centers

You can also have secondary symmetry centers (their sign is a smaller diamond-like shape). If there is at least one secondary symmetry center, then the stroke you draw (or multiple strokes, if some reflectional/rotational symmetry is set) is drawn in one additional copy for each of the secondary symmetry centers, translated with the vector between the main symmetry center and this secondary symmetry center.

Adding, removing and moving symmetry centers

• Click on a (main or secondary) symmetry center to grab it and then while keeping the button pressed, you can move it around the drawing area.
• Click on the drawing area where there is no symmetry center to add a new secondary symmetry center, which can also be moved around while keeping the button pressed.

• Right-click on a secondary symmetry center to remove it.

• Click on the delete secondary symmetry centers button to delete all secondary symmetry centers.

Palette Window

This is a separate window that can be toggled from the menu or with its keyboard shortcut (F5). Click on a slot in the color palette to set the pen color to this color. You can also drag and drop a color slot on another (the pen and background color or a quick palette color).