Creating Color Variations

Edit Textures

To customize your character their textures can be modified in a 3rd party editing program like Photoshop. To do this:

1. Switch Anima to content Edit Mode.

2. Select a character from the Actors Library.

3. Select the Rest-Pose and Actor Editor mode from the Motion Clips library.

4. If you are trying to edit a library Default Actor or a Purchased Actor you need to first create a “local copy” of it inside your Project. Right-click and select Duplicate.

5. The new asset will be marked with a “star icon” identifying it as Project Asset. Now, select it.

6. In the Actor Information Panel, double-click on any of the Textures in the Texture Browser.

7. A folder opens showing all of the texture maps for the selected actor.

8. Open any of these in an image editor and make your changes.

9. When you’re done, save the texture and return to Anima.

10. Click Save in the Actor Information panel to commit the changes and update the preview.

1. Select a character from the Actors Library.
2. Select the Rest-Pose and Actor Editor mode from the Motion Clips library.
3. In the Actor Information Panel, change the Edit Textures mode to Generate Variations.
4. Use the Variation slider to move through the existing variations.
5. To Create a new variation, click .
6. Change the colors using the Color Filter, Filter amount, Modify Hue, Modify Saturation and Modify Luminosity sliders.
7. If you’d like to add another variation, click Create again and repeat the process.
8. You can also randomize the color settings by clicking . Keep clicking until you find a combination you like and either click save or use the sliders to fine-tune it.
9. When you’re happy with your variations click Save. They’ll now be available for every scene saved in this project.

To control what parts of a model to randomize, you can set different materials as Changeable or Protected. Only changeable materials can be edited using the Generate Variations tool. So Anima automatically detects the materials applied to your character models and assigns them to the Protected list. To be able to add variations, you can move one or more materials to the Changeable by following these steps:

1. Select a character from the Actors Library.
2. Select the Rest-Pose and Actor Editor mode from the Motion Clips library.
3. In the Actor Information Panel, change the Edit Textures mode to Protect Range.
4. Drag the materials you want to be able to edit from the Protected list to the Changeable list. 
5. The protected part of the model is shown in solid yellow, and the changeable part displays their maps.
6. Switch Edit Textures Mode to Generate Variations and follow the instructions in the previous procedure to create new colors.

In addition, to be able to protect whole materials, Anima also enables you to protect parts of a map based on image data include the hue, saturation, and lightness of pixels. You can do that by following the steps described below:

1. Select a character from the Actors Library.
2. Select the Rest-Pose and Actor Editor mode from the Motion Clips library.
3. In the Actor Information Panel, change the Edit Textures mode to Protect Range.
4. Drag the materials you want to be able to edit from the Protected list to the Changeable list.
5. At the moment the whole material will be changeable, for example, this man’s shoes, trousers and shirt will all be editable. Note the protected areas shown in yellow.

6. Change the Protect Hue Range, Protect Saturation Range and Protect Lightness range sliders to isolate the part of the image you want to protect. 

7. Use the Threshold slider to increases or decreases the amount of partially selected areas. 

8. Save and switch Edit Textures Mode to Generate Variations and follow the instructions in the previous procedure to create new colors. In our example, we’re creating variations of just the shirt, even though the trousers are a part of the same texture and no mask has been manually created!

Actor Information

Snapshot Thumbnail – Takes a snapshot of the current character and sets it as the thumbnail.

Import Thumbnail – Opens a file browser so you can load a thumbnail from disk. File formats supported are JPG, PNG, and TGA.

Add New Variation – Click this button to add a new color Variation for the selected character. Only available when Edit Textures mode is set to Generate Variations.

Delete Current Variation – Click this button to delete the active color Variation for the selected character. Only available when Edit Textures mode is set to Generate Variations.

Randomize Current Variation – Click this button to randomize the parameters of the color Variation for the selected character. This can be a very fast way to quickly create a lot of variations and works well as the starting point for custom colors. Only available when Edit Textures mode is set to Generate Variations.

Save – Save the changes to the selected character.

Custom Name – The name of the selected character. If this is an imported character the file name will be used automatically but you can edit it here.

Description – A description of the selected character. You can use this to include any useful information about the actor.

Edit Textures Mode – Sets the Texture editing mode. Use Show Textures to give you instant access to all available maps for easy manipulation in a 3rd party photo editing program. Use Protect Range to control which Material and parts of the maps are affected by the color variations features. Use Generate Variations to create color variations for your models in just a few clicks.

Texture Browser – Show a list of all the texture maps used on the selected actor. Double click one of these to open a folder where they will be available for editing in a 3rd party app.

Protect Hue Range – Defines a hue range that is not affected by color variations.

Protect Saturation Range – Defines a saturation range that is not affected by color variations.

Protect Lightness Range – Defines a lightness range that is not affected by color variations.

Threshold – Controls how wide a range is in the selection, and increases or decreases the amount of partially selected areas. Low values to restrict the range and create an abrupt transition between protected and unprotected areas, higher values increase the range and create a smoother transition.

Changeable Materials – List the materials that are used to create color variations.

Protected Materials – List the materials that are not used to create color variations.

Variation – Sets the current color variation. Move this slider to go through all your saved variations.

Color filter – Sets the Hue value of the Color Filter. This is mixed with the original maps and any Hue, Saturation and luminosity modifications. The strength of the mix effect is controlled by the filter amount.

Filter amount – Controls the strength of the color filter effect. At 100% Only the Color Filter effect is used. At 0% Only the Modify Hue effect is used. Values in between blend between the Color Filter and Modify Hue effects.

Modify hue – Shifts the hue for the changeable parts of the maps.

Modify saturation – Edits the saturation for the changeable parts of the maps.

Modify luminosity – Edits the lightness for the changeable parts of the maps.