Basic Actions You Can Animate on Procreate Video Link

NOTE: There are no digital files available with this video, but on the upcoming animation project videos, there will be :)

00:01:51 - Canvas Set Up

I used the Square canvas option that comes with the Procreate app. If you somehow deleted yours, you can make a new canvas with a size of 2048 px x 2048 px and and RGB color profile.

Once in the canvas, I went to the Actions Menu (the wrench icon) and went to the Canvas subcategory and toggled the Drawing Guide on. Then, I went to Edit Drawing Guide and I dragged the Grid Size slider all the way to the right to "MAX" so that the grid was only four squares on the entire canvas.

I used the Monoline brush in the Calligraphy category and I used a Black color.

Then, I created a circle on the canvas using the Quick Shape feature on Procreate. You hold the pencil down after creating the circle and it will snap to either an ellipse or a circle shape. You can then edit the shape up in the top bar that comes on the screen. Switch it to circle if it is on the ellipse option and then adjust the nodes of the circle so that they align with the guidelines. This is to ensure your circle is exactly in the center.

I also did a Color Fill on the circle by dragging the black color from the Color Dot into my circle.

I also decided to make my circle a little smaller. To do this I used the Transform Tool (the arrow icon) to resize the circle while keeping the nodes aligned on the guidelines.

And then, I turned off the Drawing Guide.

At this point in the video, I mentioned the Procreate for Beginners: Animations video as a recommendation for you to watch because I go in depth about all of the animation features and tools on Procreate in that video.

But I did go over some things again in this video too. I explained that animations are based on the layers in your canvas. In this particular animation video, I'm not doing anything fancy for the background so I just used the Background Layer on the canvas (and I kept it the default white color). Because I didn't use an additional layer for my background, I could then use a temporary background layer in Animation Assist as a guide. I could've also used a foreground layer like I did in the previous video that I mentioned (Procreate for Beginners: Animations), but, in fact, you'll see that I ended up using both a background and foreground layer as guides for my animations in this video.

Then, I went back to the Actions Menu (wrench icon) and still under the Canvas subcategory, I toggled the Animation Assist feature on. I showed how the frames in the Animation Assist bar on the bottom correspond with the Layers Panel on the canvas. I added a frame with the <ADD FRAME> button on the Animation Assist bar. I then had to drag that new frame over to the left of the frame that has the black circle in it to make this frame my background guide layer.

For that background layer, I temporarily turned Animation Assist off and my Drawing Guide back on so I could use it to draw a horizontal line and a vertical line along the center guides of the canvas. I also drew a diagonal line from corner to opposite corner on the canvas. (Later on in the video, I draw another diagonal between the other two corners also).

Then, I renamed the layer to "Guide" to help keep things organized. I also reduced the opacity on the background guide layer that I just created by selecting that layer in the Layers Panel and then clicking on the "N" next to the layer name and dragging the opacity slider down (I did this to 30% but you can do whatever works for you)

Then, I turned the Drawing Guide off and turned Animation Assist back on, I clicked on <Settings> in the Animation Assist bar and reduced the Onion Skin frames down to 1 so that it will only show 1 frame before and after the selected frame. And then, I closed the settings menu.

Next, I clicked on the background guide layer in the Animation Assist bar and then toggled it on to "Background".

00:09:37 - Blinking Animation

In order to achieve this animation result, you have to alternate between having the object on or off the screen. So, for the frames in the animation, you're going to alternate between the frame with the black circle and frames that are blank.

So, I clicked on <ADD FRAME> again to get another blank layer/frame. Then I alternated duplicating the frame with the black circle (by selecting that layer in the Layers Panel and moving it to the correct position in the timeline, and duplicating the blank frame (by clicking on that frame and selecting <DUPLICATE>) and moving it to the correct position in the timeline. In the end, I decided that I wanted the first frame to be blank so I moved the last blank frame to the first position in the timeline (to the right of the background guide layer).

In order to preview the animation as it's intended, you need to click on the background guide frame in the Animation Assist bar and toggle it to "off" on "Background". Then, you need to click the checkbox for that same layer on the Layers Panel in order to turn off the visibility for that layer. To preview the animation, click the <Play> button on the Animation Assist bar. In the <Settings> menu within Animation Assist bar, you can change the type of playback between loop, ping-pong, and one-shot.

To make the blinking object be on the screen for longer at some point in your animation, you need to either duplicate that layer (for however many extra frames you want to have) in the Layers Panel, or you need to click on that frame in the Animation Assist bar and slide the "hold duration" slider up to however many extra frames you want it to hold. And you can do the same thing on a blank frame to have a longer pause in between blinks of the object.

00:15:03 - 2D Motion - Horizontal

To bring your canvas back to "normal" for the next animation, first, delete all extra layers/frames except one black circle frame and your background guide layer. Turn the visibility back on the background guide layer. Then, in the Animation Assist bar, click on the background guide layer and toggle the "background" option back on.

To move the object along the horizontal guideline, you need to duplicate the black circle layer and then use the Transform Tool (arrow icon) to move the circle slightly to the right of the previous layer. While you are using the Transform Tool, make sure you keep the settings on "Uniform" at the bottom, and make sure your "Snapping" setting is turned on. As I previously said, you can keep your previous layer on the screen as a guide or "onion skin" by going to <Settings> and sliding the "Onion Skin Count" slider to the amount of onion skins you want to show before or after your selected frame. I usually keep mine at one. This way you can see where the circle was previously and how far you are moving the circle in the current frame. I moved mine roughly 1/4 of the previous circle over horizontally. And then, I kept doing this until I reached the end of the screen. Then, I did the same thing as the previous animation: briefly turned off the background in Animation Assist, then turned the visibility of that layer off in the Layers Panel, then clicked <Play> to preview.

00:19:30 - 2D Motion - Vertical

Then, I reset the canvas back to the same spot as in the previous two animations: one frame of the black circle in the center of the canvas, and my background guide layer turned back on and toggled to "background" again.

And then, I moved the black circle along the vertical line, just as I did the horizontal line in the previous example using the Transform Tool to move the black circle, vertically and ever so slightly every frame.

Then, I previewed the animation, and reset my canvas once again.

00:20:30 - 2D Motion Diagonal

Next, I applied the same method along the diagonal line, making sure to keep the center of the circle on that diagonal guideline.

Then, I previewed the animation again, and then, reset the canvas for the next animation.

00:21:57 - Moving on an Arc

For this next animation, I needed to make a new guide. So, I made a new layer on the top of the Layers Panel which I used as a "Foreground" rather than a "Background". On this layer, I first turned on my Drawing Guide again and then clicked "Edit Drawing Guide" in the Actions Menu to make more of the grid show up on the canvas. I also changed the color of the guide lines to a pink for more contrast. Then, I reduced the opacity of the layer with the black circle temporarily so I could see the guide through it. Then, I selected the new layer that was going to be more foreground layer and drew a circle that touched all of the sides of the canvas. Then, I used the Transform Tool to move that circle down so that the top apex of the circle went through the center point on the canvas (marked by the Drawing Guide lines) - which is also where the center of the black circle is. Next, I restored the black circle layer to 100% opacity, and reduced the opacity of the new layer with the arc. Then, I also made that layer my "foreground" frame in the Animation Assist bar - similarly to how I made the other guide layer my background frame.

Using a similar method to the 2D motion animations earlier in the video, I duplicated the black circle layer, and moved the duplicate layer using the Transform Tool along the arc. It is a little more difficult to keep the center of the circle along the arc than it is keeping it on a straight line.

Then, I previewed the animation after I turned off the foreground option in Animation Assist and toggled the visibility off in the Layers Panel.

And then, I reset the canvas back to having one of the black circle frames and both my foreground and background guide layers.

00:27:01 - Moving on a Spiral

To make the spiral guide, I cleared the arc guide off the foreground layer, and just drew a spiral path on the layer starting at the center of the canvas. No measuring on this one, just freehand. Then, I toggled the visibility back on in the Layers Panel and turned the "Foreground" option back on in Animation Assist.

Then, I duplicated the black circle frame and then used the Transform Tool again to move the circle along the spiral path. Only this time, some of the circles ended up with parts of the circle off the canvas and therefore "cut off". So, in some cases, I had to duplicate a circle in a previous frame instead and then move that frame to where it is supposed to be in the sequence, otherwise I would end up with circles with pieces missing out of them.

Then, I previewed the animation after toggling the foreground off on my guide frame and then turning off the visibility in the Layers Panel.

Then, again, I reset the canvas back to having one black circle frame in the center of the canvas and my two guide layers.

00:31:40 - Rotating

For this animation, I used my background guide layer again, but I added the other diagonal line to it (like I said earlier in my explanation - if you already did it, you're ahead of the game!). Then, while on the layer with the black circle, I also added a small white circle toward the edge of the black circle along the horizontal guide line to the right of the center point.

This time, when I duplicated this black circle layer and used the Transform Tool, I used. the green node to rotate the black circle around to the next guideline in sequence - which creates a 45 degree angle from the starting guideline. (I did mine counter-clockwise) I continued this process around on each guideline that was on my guide.

Then, I previewed the animation, as I did the others in this video. And I then, reset the canvas back to "normal" with the single black circle (I filled the white circle back in with a black color) frame and my two guide layers.

00:37:03 - Growing

For the next two animations, I used the Drawing Guide rather than the guides I made. So, I turned that back on, and edited it so I ended up with the Black circle being contained in a 4 x 4 square (16 squares total). As I stated in the video, somehow my circle ended up not being quite perfect so it was a little longer than it is wide so I had to keep that in mind when doing these last two animations.

Once, my drawing guide was set up, I then, duplicated the circle layer and used the Transform Tool to increase the size of the circle (again, make sure you have "uniform" selected in the Transformation Settings Menu and keep "snapping" turned on). I stretched the circle size out so that the bounding box and nodes lined up with the next set of vertical guidelines (ideally it would've been both vertical and horizontal guidelines but since my circle was a little messed up, that wasn't working)

Then, I previewed the animation and reset the canvas.

00:40:28 - Shrinking

This animation was done the same way as the last one just in the opposite direction (making the circle smaller in every frame). I used the same guidelines from the Drawing Guide.

These are the basic animation actions you can do in Procreate. Coming up soon, I'm going to do projects that illustrate these actions in a more practical way.