5

I'm not new to Photoshop but I'm new to animations in Photoshop and my question is how to animate vector shapes in Photoshop. I have made a simple paper plane and then refolded it in Photoshop. T

he problem is that it doesn't have many frames, and I need the animation to be more smoother. Is there some way to just animate the shapes points?

I tried the tweening, but that doesn't help since I'm using the frame by frame animation and just hiding groups with canvases

Here's what I have now and I'm not so happy with the result, since I still think its missing some frames to be more smooth.

Canvas animation

Improve this question
5
  • I guess I'm unsure with what you mean making it smoother, because it looks smooth to me. How would you qualify smoothness? And don't more frames / smaller steps make something smoother?
    – Hanna
    Commented Jul 17, 2015 at 21:31
  • 1
    You could try Easing. This makes the animation speed up or slow down in places. I would try Easing Out at the end. That might make it appear smoother.
    – Andy Stone
    Commented Jul 18, 2015 at 0:21
  • 1
    Well I've found out that the Adobe AE has the future to animate shape points, so I guess that's the way. Photoshop is missing such future so you have to do it like I did, frame by frame ... annoyingly ... :)
    – Bartando
    Commented Jul 18, 2015 at 7:29
  • You might want to check out Edge Animate as well.
    – Joonas
    Commented Jul 18, 2015 at 12:43
  • 1
    Looks interesting, maybe its what I need. But I have tried the Adobe AE, and the effect looks better and smoother, its just something new.
    – Bartando
    Commented Jul 18, 2015 at 16:37

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

Photoshop animation is strictly limited to these changes:

  • Opacity
  • Position
  • Layer visibility
  • perhaps some adjustment layer attributes

None of the vector features have special attributes that can be animated beyond the above. Between each frame "state", all of the underlying layer bitmap contents and vector shapes are fundamentally unchanged.

Tweening won't help much because it merely adds steps (e.g. adding 50% between 0% and 100%) of the above attributes in between what is already there. It cannot determine where any of the pixels appear to be moving, unlike AE.

"[T]he problem is that it doesn't have many frames, …"

So you will have to add more manually. They will likely need to be separate shapes, visible only in their own frame.

You might also get better results in Flash, which does have adjustable shapes.

Improve this answer
1
  • You are right, better use After Effects or Flash ... :) thanks
    – Bartando
    Commented Jul 19, 2015 at 14:41

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.