J13Pro

Thanks for looking, I'm very new and need help to convert my Pivot animation into a video and add music. Dont know what to use or how to. If anyone can, please help me, because i really want to animate but it sucks without music and not be able to convert it to an actule Video (mpeg, avi, flash, etc) Help please.

Again thanks for your time.

wk2004

Thanks and welcome to the J13Pro Forum!

I have been getting a lot of this specific kind of question for Pivot Stick Figure Animator, so I'll more than likely put this as a sticky (and might consider putting it on the main site). Anyway...

To start off, there are a few programs you need, depending on what degree of help you need. I will address the process step-by-step, so skim through if you already know some of the first steps.

Programs (need not all of them to be open):
- Pivot 3 Beta or Pivot 2.2.5
- Windows Movie Maker (or almost any video editing program)

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First off, in the Pivot program:
1. Open your .piv file (File -> Open Animation -> (Name of file))

2. Click Save Animation (File -> Save Animation)

3. Below the text box where you put the filename, there should be a drop-down box (it will say "Pivot File (*.piv)" by default). Click the drop-down box and click "Animated GIF (*.gif)".

4. One of two things happen, depending on the version of your Pivot program. To check the version, go to the About box (Help -> About). Alternatively, if the default Stickman is thin and has a black non-filled circle as a head, it's Pivot 2.2.5 or before. If it's a thicker and a black filled circle head, then it's Pivot 3 Beta.

(Pivot 2.2.5)
4a1. A box will pop up that has Optimization (3 checkboxes that says Merge, Crop, and Palette), Frame Delay (1/100th second), and Shrink Frames.

4a2. Uncheck Merge and Palette.

4a3. For Frame Delay, it can be any speed you want. The bigger the number, the slower the animation will go. For those who likes the default preview speed, go between 6 - 8.

4a4. For the Shrink Frames, the default should be 1 in the box. Leave as is if you want the better quality for video (though it will take up a lot more disk space than if it is 2).

4a5. Click OK.

(Pivot 3 Beta)
4b1. A box will pop up that has Optimization (3 Checkboxes that says Merge, Crop, and Palette), Resize, and Super Sample. All you need to worry about is the frame rate and Resize.

4b2. The frame rate will correspond to the frame rate you set as your preview speed (the higher that number below the scrollbar speed, the faster your animation will be).

4b3. For Resize, change it to 100 for best video quality (leave as is if you're not too worried about that or concerned about file size).

4b4. Click OK.

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Posting Pivots as Images

For those who only needs to know how to post these images on forums or whatever, upload the image that was just made from the instructions above on a image host site like photobucket or imageshack or pivothost.org.

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So you got your Animated GIF file. Now what?
Open up your video editing program (I will use Windows Movie Maker as an example because that's what I use)
5. Once it is open, click Import Pictures.

6. Look for your newly made GIF file (should be (filename).gif) and select it, then click Import.

Once it's imported completely, it is ready to be used! The GIF file will act almost the exact same way as a video clip. Only difference is that be careful when you're shortening or lengthening the GIF clip, or the clip will play differently. Other than that, you can split the clip (without affecting the play loop of the clip) and even add video effects and whatnot to the clip. You can also add sounds here (in the editing timeline), as well.

And don't forget to save it on your computer as a video (click Save to my computer if in WMM). It won't work if you try to upload the WMM file that's used to edit the timeline.

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Sounds
Adding sounds is a whole another issue (and quite shorter). You can find the same sounds I used at findsounds.com or flashkit.com. Sometimes, especially Windows Movie Maker, plays .wav files too fast or too slow. To correct this:

1. Go open up Sound Recorder (Start -> Programs -> Accesories -> Entertainment -> Sound Recorder).

2. Load the .wav file that played differently in the editing program. (File -> Open...).

3. Click Save As... (File -> Save As...)

4. At the bottom of the box, there should be a line of text after Format:. If it's not "PCM 44.100 kHz, 16 Bit, Stereo" exactly, click Change... and change the settings accordingly (PCM, 44.100 kHz 16 Bit Stereo).

5. Save the file (preferably under a different name so it won't ruin your sound indefinitely).

There you go. It should be able to play it in any video editing program.

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If you have any problems concerning the same topic, reply here and I or a mod will respond.

Thanks Jayther,
It helped me alot, The only thing is that i havent tried it yet, i'm at work and dont have all that i need and this pc wont let me download anything. BUt i'll try it at home and i pictured all the steps you said, I know what you mean. So i figured it out. Thanks again for your help...Soon i'll post my animation and tell me how it is for a first timer...
Cant wait to get started...

carojones here um... how do i make back grounds and stuff cause im very new at this.

first you need to have a picture in Jpeg format. You can copy pictures from the internet or go to paint in your pc and make up your own drawing for background. Than save type as jpeg format.

And in your pivot software before you start to animate, go to file than load background, than find the picture you want as your background and click ok when you pick your picture.

done

NOTE: you can change the background in anyways you like...
Best thing to do is just keep playing with it. its really fun...but takes time...

I made my first animation and if you like to see it go to http://video.yahoo.com/video/play?vid=1 ... =ush1-mail

i did the back ground in painting in my pc...

good luck

for some reason every time i try to save it keeps saying out of memory. HELP?!

Probably because your computer is running low on memory (RAM or possibly hard drive). This means that you have too many programs running or too much RAM-hogging spyware/adware, or both.

Try not having a whole lot of programs at a time while saving it as a GIF image. (I know it's gonna sound like one of those setup messages, but) close all programs that you do not need to use before running Pivot or saving any image file.

If that doesn't help, press Ctrl + Alt + Del to see the Task Manager, then click on the Performance tab, then tell me what the number under PF Usage is and all of the numbers under Physical Memory (Total, Available (tell me what number it floats around because it changes every second), System Cache).

hey man i found a sound on findsounds.com and idk what to do.. like how do i add it to my video??

read the whole instructions. you should be able to import audio/music. -]

oi jayther, how do i do decent blood splats on the wall, and can you give me some tips on constucting items, etc?

please ask that question in a new topic, not here.

I have never used windows movie make or any movie maker of the sort and i dont fully understand how to get the audio clips into the movie itself, and how to get it into the specif frame i want it to be, how do i do that specifically?


Dragons Rock

i have never used windows movie maker or any movie maker of the sort and i cant figure out how to get the audio clips i want to add into the frames, what do i have to do specifically?

i have never used windows movie maker or any movie maker of the sort and i cant figure out how to get the audio clips i want to add into the frames, what do i have to do specifically?

How far did you get into importing the sound?
If you haven't actually imported the sound (Import Music/Audio or something like that), then you need to do that.

If you have, then the audio clips should act like they were video clips, except they go on a separate track on the timeline named Audio/Music (you're in timeline mode, right? not Storyboard?).

You'd have to zoom in all the way and then move around/add the sound in a specific location of the timeline that you want to add to.

Hope this helps -D