Need help with cutout animation setup action

[JohnArtbox]

Hi
I'm trying to setup an action that does the following.

select the entire frame - not essential as it can be done once by hand
select the topmost layer - done
cut to brush - done
optimise brush -done
export brush - done
set export name to layer name -???
set export type tp png RGBA NoPreMultiply- ????
move down one layer- done
repeat action until there are no more layers -???

I'm using the cutouts with skeletons in Anime Studio. Basically I do all the artwork in tvp, creating each body part on a separate layer with an appropriate name and then export each layer as a cropped png file. The parts of the action I've figured out already speed export up considerably, but if I could work out how to use the layer name it would save a hell of a lot more.
All help appreciated.

[Fabrice]

You have to use george script commands. (it's a little more complex than using the actions which are limited regarding your needs)
We will try to help you as soon as possible.

[slowtiger]

Although I sometimes use the same workflow (TVP artwork into AS), I never did the exporting automatically. I do it by hand via the export panel, mainly because I can set "premultiply y/n" there. Also I don't optimize automatically because often I do several views of a body part in TVP which need to register so I don't have to rearrange them in AS.

But nice to see that at least one other member here knows about the power of AS!

[JohnArtbox]

Thanks Fabrice that would be fantastic
I haven't used actions before, and was impressed with how much they can do. Even performing one click instead of four makes for a dramatically improved workflow.
I'll look forward to developments.
Slowtiger: You do good work
I'm exporting by hand at the moment...but I've got a series of projects which this would make much easier, especially since my characters use a lot of switch groups. On the other side of the equation, do you know an easy way to import multiple images into AS?
I usually spit out a registration image to make lining the character up again easy. My experiments led me to believe that PNG's set toNoPremultiply work best, but I'm relatively new to AS.

[slowtiger]

AS importing: see answer in that forum over there.

Switch groups: I often import small QT loops into AS, or a set of heads from different angles. For this I crop the project before exporting.

Premultiply on/off: the result seems to depend on what I want to stack on each other: bright on bright, dark on dark, or any combination. I should do some serious testing if I find the time ...

[Paul Fierlinger]

Just a small warning. I have streamlined my exports of avi's to be imported into Vegas. It's very efficient and I can do it with one button on the Wacom tablet. But here's the problem: every once in awhile, maybe every tenth export or so, something triggers the export panel to select PNG instead of remembering AVI, which sets up a whole stream of PNG images to start filling up my folder until I see what's going on and stop it with Esc.

[Mike]

Here is a tvpx file which contains a button to export all the layers in PNG.

The action is a full embedded george script (because the "simple" action can't do loop)
I added comments if you want to modify it

When you click on the button, it will will ask you a directory (the filename is not important (you can leave the one by default) because it will be replaced by each layer name)
Click on OK, and then the script will start to loop on all the layers. For each layer, create a custom brush, export it as PNG in the selected directory with each file name starts with the name of the layer

Test it and let me know !

[JohnArtbox]

Genius. The script worked perfectly.
Thank you......a lot.
Plus I opened it up in notepad to look at the script and it makes sense , thanks to the excellent commenting. I'm going to try to make a second version which doesn't optimise the brush so that elements maintain their positions.
I've got some actions that I created to make the cutout process a bit faster, so I'll add these to the panel.

[slowtiger]

I will try that once my "new" machine is set up completely.

It's amazing how many programs need to be installed and updated. At least TVP this time behaved well, all I had to do was to install, copy the "tvp animation 9 pro" folder into the library, and replace the "papers" folder inside the programm package.