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Best Practices for Character Art?

PunkDrake

Hey there, I've been learning Spine for a while and then took a long break from it for reasons, and now that I'm coming back to it I wanna start actually doing stuff in it with my own artwork. I can draw just fine, but I am curious as to what some of you think are the best practices for cutting up your character art to animate in Spine.
I draw in an anime inspired art style and I'd like to do characters who can be viewed from multiple angles. so what do you guys think are the best practices for that?
I'm thinking it would be things like making sure the upper and lower legs and arms are all separate, separating the feet from the legs, and giving the hands many different poses, the torso and hips and neck would likely be a single piece, and the head would be its own blank space with the eyes and mouth having their own attachments for frame by frame animating.
any suggestions, videos, and pictures that can help would be greatly appreciated. thanks.

skarasuko

Along with your art style, it can be helpful to identify an "animation style" as well. Results in the Spine animation can vary depending on your animation style and current production objectives.

I cut up my layers in a very advanced way. This includes a full facial rig and hand rig. The face rig consists of a "head" with the eye and mouth cut out. What's behind it are: "Sclera", "Iris", "Inner Mouth", "Tongue", "Teeth". In front: The Eyelash and Eyebrows. The "hand rig" is something I don't recommend for most people, but I can do a full range of hand poses with the finger layers.

Separating the body parts, in general, is the standard way for Spine rigs. The complex part after this is setting the weights (Pro).

PunkDrake

I actually considered the hand rig method before but I figured it might be a tad bit too complicated so I reconsidered the hand pose images method instead. tho I havent made anything yet so I still got my options to make whatever.
skins are also something Im interested in learning but every time I look at guides for the folders and skins names in the PSD file I get confused. it looks complicated and I dont know what to name what.

skarasuko

It will take a good amount of time to handle Skins. I recommend you read up on it in terms of Editor experience. I don't actually set the Skins in PSD, but in the Editor after I import the layers.

Look up Linked Meshes as well. You can set identically shaped but differently colored / textured images as a Linked Mesh and set another Skin to display that instead of the original Mesh. Any changes to the mesh vertices and weights in the original Mesh will transfer to the Linked Mesh.

PunkDrake

that sounds interesting and helpful. got any sources on where I can read up on those or watch videos on them?

skarasuko

All I can say is keep learning from trying. The official User Guides can be found here as well as Video tutorials on the bottom of most guides. Spine User Guide

Skins: Skins - Spine User Guide

PunkDrake

so if you make a slot attachment of a certain size, and want to add another image to that slot thats bigger than the original slot attachment, can you do that? or would it be more wise to work in order from biggest to smallest?

skarasuko

Think of Slots as "Layered Containers". Their main purpose is to determine the order (Draw Order) of the images it is containing. However, a slot can only display one image at a time.

For example, you can have 5 images inside 1 slot, but they cannot be displayed simultaneously. If these 5 images, however, make up a specific frame-by-frame animation, then you can key the image (attachment) display in the Animation Timeline. You can put 5 different Right Hand images in 1 slot that is named as "Hand_R"

Note that each image have their own Transform properties and their own Weights if you intend to bind them to specific bones.

PunkDrake

I actually knew all that already, I was just wondering about mesh size stuff. I remember hearing something about animating a mesh in a slot a specific way and that mesh animation not working when the slot was switched or because they wanted a bigger image than the original was or something? I dont remember the details of it so thats what I was asking about. but thanks for being helpful

actually quick edit, but I didnt know that very last thing you said lol.

skarasuko

The last statement I made probably is related to your issue. You do not want to switch the images to a different slot in Setup Mode. They have to stay in the Slot permanently if it is intended to be in that Draw Order placement. However, I believe any of the mesh transformations applied in Animate Mode is preserved for the images even if they relocate to a different slot.

Unless, did you perhaps try to change the image attachment to a different one? If the replacement attachment's PNG dimension is different, Spine will have a few options to try to resize it. But I strongly do not recommend switching images to a different sized one.

Also, could you clarify your issues related to the "size" of your images?

PunkDrake

I haven't done anything yet lol I only just started using Spine. I was asking this question as I was making my art for my first character to be rigged. I wasn't having any issues with anything because I havent done anything yet. I was just asking questions relating to the best practices for making art assets for Spine if you intend on doing turn arounds and skins. I wanted to know ahead of time what was needed and what I should avoid. so I havent run into any issues cuz I didnt even get started yet lol

skarasuko

Ah. I see. Well, you can only learn efficiency by trying from your artwork to Spine. Efficiency is something that will simply take time from experience.

I am not sure what exactly you're referring to when you say "turn-arounds", because the visual representation can take form in two ways: Frames and Mesh Deformation. Frames is recommended for simple character arts, when you need to prioritize on "redrawing" the character in different angles. Mesh Deformation is recommended for illustrations, which Live2D features heavily on. You usually want to choose between these styles depending on your goal.

But if your artwork is very detailed, it tends to be difficult to rig them to bend their limbs very far unless you plan it correctly.