Bones for Objects

The objects, including characters and props, can be bone-rigged. The bones can then animate the objects by driving the triangulated wireframes surrounding the element in the sprite.

ClosedThe relationships between Object, Bone and Sprite

The most fundamental structure of an object is one object composed of one bone and one sprite, take a simple prop as an example:

  • Switch to the Composer mode to notice that the object contains one dummy bone and one sprite.
  • Open the Sprite Editor and you will see the sprite and all of its elements in the sprite (this example only has one element).
  • If you add bones to the object, the bones and sprite are actually the child nodes of the dummy bone.
  • The added bones can only animate the first element of the sprite, the rest of the element, if any, in the same sprite will not be influenced by the bones.

    Therefore, there will be no effect when you adjust the bones while trying to animate the object.
  • You can attach more sprites to the bones by adding new layers to a selected bone via the Layer Manager.
  • The child-bones will only influence the newly attached sprite.
ClosedBones and Sprite

Since the added bones and the sprite are both under the dummy bone, they can have different relations:

  • When an object is composed of multiple sprites, each sprite will have an initial bone under the dummy bone.
  • You can add more bones under these initial bones.

    These bones will affect the individual sprite element.
ClosedBones and Sprite for Characters

The bones for characters also follow the rules in previous section. However, the bone and sprite have limitations:

  • A bone and the sprite attached to it has been given a specific name and can not be renamed.
  • Any attached props will become accessories and can only be animated by its parent bone only.
  • You can freely add more bones to the accessories.
  • The bones can also be given spring properties to create a bouncy effect.