We know that not every ColdHardFlash reader is an expert Flash animator, able to design, rig and animate their own custom characters, let alone animate straight-ahead with the tool. But now Flash animators everywhere have the power to create fast and easy character animations with CrazyTalk Animator, an all-in-one software package that increases your productivity by allowing artists of all skill-levels to create characters from photographs, or image files, and animate them with mouse movements or an intuitive puppeteering panel.Create animations in minutes and export them in SWF format for use in Flash designs, Flash Banners, App Designs and Flash games. Check out this demo video below and click this link to show your support for CHF and CrazyTalk Animator.

I have to admit that Flash has begun to look like a real 3rd rate option these days, with Toon Boom taking the lead for 2D production. As a basic animation tool, Flash remains a solid option, but it’s going nowhere, at least for us animators. Adobe isn’t steering the software down a path that helps us, and older (arguably better) versions of the software cease to be supported on new operating systems. The only things keeping me interested in the future of Flash are the independent developers building animation-specific extensions. Below is a demo video for the Keyframe Caddy, which was developed by the Cloudkid team – consisting of Dave Schlafman and Matt Moore. The plug-in offers an animator a visual display of graphic symbols, which helps make tasks like lip sync much easier. I’ve seen similar plug-ins in the past, but this one seems nice and simple.

Developers at Ubisoft in France have hatched a new animation tool called UBIart, that focuses on “interactive creation.” It’s a proprietary tool, and the fact that they’re promoting its existence makes me think they’ll offer it to the public at some point. With user-generated content invading the video gaming world (like LittleBigPlanet), it would make sense, especially in light of Ubisoft’s announcement of ManiaPlanet, a “user-powered” game coming later this year. UBIart appears to work like Flash – or probably more like Toon Boom – allowing the user to import any medium and then animate using rigs.

The artist working the tablet here is Christophe Villez, a graduate of Gobelins, and his work is then animated by Anthony Le Du.

… and this piece discusses the UBIart framework, and then leads into a trailer for Rayman Origins.

by Aaron Simpson and Sean McKenzie

Whether or not Apple allows Flash on the iPhone doesn’t really effect us animators. Our Flash animations are enjoyed by the viewer in the same way whether they’re delivered in an FLV, an HTML5 video player or an MPEG-4. But it sure has complicated things, especially for artist using the software for more interactive projects. Animators like Allan Dye (Pocket God) working are on iPhone games have had to go through complicated production methods to translate their Flash animated elements (and the accompanying XML) into the iPhone environment. Sites we love like Newgrounds, which feature primarily SWF-based animations and games, simply aren’t accessible on the growing suite of Apple’s mobile devices.

To shed some light on how this all started, and where it’s left us, we’re going back to the source. We welcome back Jonathan Gay, the iPhone-carrying co-creator of Flash (then called “FutureSplash”), who we interviewed in 2008. Gay left Adobe in 2005, and has since founded and sold an energy management software start-up along with fellow Flash pioneers Robert Tatsumi and Gary Grossman. Below, he starts by addressing some of the criticism Apple Chairman and CEO Steve Jobs has flung at Flash.

AARON SIMPSON: Do you think Flash should be more open, or as Jobs put it – less of a “closed system?”
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Toon Boom has just announced the upcoming release of Animate 2, a powerful software package that rivals Flash. The second iteration of the software includes full SWF export, better velocity controls and a type tool. The pre-launch price is $549.99, and if you buy now, they’ll give you the first version to use until its’ successor arrives. Here’s some of my favorite Toon Boom animation from recent months:

Um Lugar Comum (A Common Place) from São Paulo-based studio Split Filmes

Water FX from Canadian Chris Graf

I also really like André Ruivo’s Januário e a Guerra.