OpenToonz 1.7: How To Use It!

If you’re interested in learning how to illustrate or animate or you’re tired of you’re normal software, then OpenToonz has all the tools you need for a productive workflow.

OpenToonz is a professional open-source software that supports both Raster and Vector graphics and scanned paper drawings for traditional animations.

It has a default project hierarchy which ensures that your images, scenes and paper drawings for traditional animations, are saved in default folders so your projects are tidy and easy to find.

Raster or Vector Graphics?

Raster graphics color each pixel similar to a modern TV using bitmap lines. This is Characterized by the number of bits per pixel. Most images on your computer are stored in this format including GIF, JPEG and PNG.

The drawback with Rasters is they do not scale well, so if you want more bits per pixel or a higher DPI (Dots Per Inch) then you’ll have to rescale. But, for fluid drawing and complex colors Rasters are the best choice for digital artists.

Vector graphics are created with geometric shapes such as lines, curves and polygons which create clean shapes that can be scaled to any size. This is ideal for illustration work, but lacks the fluid application associated with Raster graphics and traditional drawing.

Setup OpenToonz

OpenToonz is available for Windows, Linux and Mac. To download the correct one for your computer go to the SnapCraft page — here for Linux, or the GitHub page — Here for Windows and Mac.

Once OpenToonz is installed let’s look at the software interface and breakdown the main areas. OpenToonz is organized into Rooms located on the far right of the menu bar.

Each Room Tab can be locked in place with the Lock Rooms Tab or re-ordered to fit your workflow.

Within each Room you’ll find pre-configured layouts. These can be changed to fit your individual needs by adding and removing panes which can be docked, resized or used as floating windows. This allows for greater flexibility when drawing or animating.

OpenToonz’ default Toolbar is located vertically on the left of the Viewer or Canvas drawing area. This can also be expanded or collapsed and contains many standard drawing tools such as Brush, Geometric shapes, Fill, Selection and Eraser. These also have shortcut keys to access them.

The Timeline or Xsheet, allows you to control the timing of the current scene which can be played back in the Viewer. The Toolbar at the top of the Timeline / Xsheet has playback, onion skin and loop controls for your animation.

However, the animation Toolbar is in a different location depending on which Room layout you use. If you choose the default Animation layout then it is separate from the Xsheet.

Each tool can be used with multiple levels by adding a new Raster or Vector level to the Timeline or Xsheet by selecting the appropriate button for the current scene.

The Timeline gives you a horizontal view of your scenes frames while the Xsheet displays them vertically, giving you greater freedom to organize projects. The columns or layers are stacked left to right in the Xsheet, and from bottom to top in the Timeline.

Drawing in OpenToonz

First decide whether you want to draw with Raster or Vector graphics. By default OpenToonz loads with an empty Raster level, which is denoted by its green color in the Xsheet or Timeline.

If you want to draw with Vectors, select a new Vector level in the toolbar or change OpenToonz default settings in — Preferences > Drawing > Default Level Type. This is denoted by a brown color in the Xsheet or Timeline.

To create another animation level, click the next cell and OpenToonz will automatically create one. Each individual drawing is shown in the Level Strip. To add the Level Strip to your Room go to — Windows > Level Strip and dock it where you want.

Vectors are easier to start with as they don’t require a drawing tablet to get smooth curves and lines, although this can also be achieved with the smooth tool. Vector-based levels are saved as PLI files and have an unlimited size and resolution while Rasters do not.

OpenToonz has a Control Points Editor tool for manipulating Vector lines, and a pump tool for thickness. This allows you to create more complex shapes with Vectors. You can also change the geometric shape from the Shape drop-down menu.

Let’s create a simple free hand bouncing ball animation. Select the Brush Tool (Shortcut: B) and set the smooth slider to 15. Draw a circle on the first frame for the starting point of your ball.

Select a fill color for your ball in the Color Pallet. If the Color Pallet has not been added to your Room go to — Windows > Style Editor and dock it where you want.

Select and draw another circle on the second frame. Double click the colored circle to toggle Onion Skin so you can see your previous frames position.

Continue with this process until you have a simple bouncing ball animation.

To play the animation click the Play button below the viewer, or you can add the Combo Viewer. Go to — Windows > Combo Viewer to add it to your Room.

How to Render and Export

To Render your animation go to — Render > Fast Render to MP4 (Shortcut: Alt + R). If you cannot render to MP4 then you’ll need the FFmpeg multimedia framework for your computer. To download FFmpeg for your computer go to the download page — here.

Alternately, if you don’t want video compression, you can Render your scene using still images by rendering them in PNG format. This will give you more control over the bit-rate and image quality. These separate images can then be imported into video editing software.

To do this go to — Render > Output Settings (Shortcut: Ctr + O). By default OpenToonz will save your animation images to +outputs file, but you can change this to another location on your computer if you want.

I like to use Kdenlive for video editing. It’s a free and open source software available for Windows, Linux and Mac. To download it go to the download page — here. Now you can import the still PNG images into Kdenlive and render them.