Animating Characters: Poses, Frames, and Expressions

How animation works in BannedStory

You don't draw keyframes. Instead you pick a state, which is the game's name for one animation such as standing or walking, and the editor plays the frames the game uses, with the game's own timing. There is no timeline, speed slider, or frame-delay editor. What you control is which state is shown, which frame is shown, and whether it plays.

A character has two separate tracks. The body uses State, a frame number box, and Animate. The face uses Face State, its own frame box, and Animate Face. Because they are independent, a character can walk while blinking, or stand perfectly still while crying.

Choosing a pose with State and Frame

1. Select the character on the canvas or in the Layer Panel. The Properties panel switches to the Character Properties tab. If the panel is hidden, press 3.
2. Open the State dropdown. Long lists are searchable: type a few letters into Search states to filter them.
3. Use the number box to the right of State to step through the frames. Frames are counted from 0, and the box stops at the last frame of the state. Changing the state sends the frame back to 0.
4. Leave Animate unticked if you want the pose to stay frozen on the frame you picked.

Common states have friendly names: "Standing 1" and "Standing 2", "Walking 1" and "Walking 2", "Alert", "Jumping", "Sit", "On Floor" (lying down), "Climbing a Ladder", "Climbing a Rope", "Flying", and "Healing". Attacks are named by weapon style, for example "1H Weapon Swing 1", "2H Weapon Stab 2", or "Weapon Shoot 1". A state the editor has no friendly name for is listed under its raw game name, such as "dead".

Previewing motion on the canvas

Tick Animate to play the current state in a loop. The frame box counts along as it plays. Untick it and the layer stops on whatever frame it had reached, which is a handy way to catch a frame by eye before fine-tuning it with the number box.

Every layer with Animate ticked plays at the same time, not only the selected one. That makes it easy to preview a whole moment: two characters walking, a monster idling beside them, and a skill effect going off.

Timing comes from the game data. In the v83 assets, for example, "Standing 1" has three frames of half a second each, while "Walking 1" has four quick frames. Some states, such as "Jumping", "Sit", and "On Floor", are a single drawing, so ticking Animate on them changes nothing. That is expected, not a bug.

Expressions with Face State and Animate Face

The Face State dropdown lists the expressions that the character's face item has, each with a small icon: Blink, Smile, Angry, Cry, Love, Wink, Bewildered, Troubled, Stunned, and many more. The exact list depends on the face, so two faces can offer different expressions. New characters start on Blink with Animate Face off.

1. Choose an expression in Face State. The face frame goes back to 0.
2. Step through the expression with the number box next to it, or tick Animate Face to loop it.
3. Mix and match with the body: Animate on with the face frozen on Angry gives you an angry walk.

If none of the built-in expressions fits, Create Custom Face opens the Face Mixer, where you combine and crop pieces of different faces. It is covered in Chat Balloons, Name Tags, Custom Faces, and Imported Pictures.

Splitting a motion into layers

Two commands in the Layers menu turn one animated layer into many still ones. They are the key to pose sheets, comic panels that show a move step by step, and hand-timed animation.

Clone Layer States

Creates one new layer for every state in the layer's sprite data (for a character, the body plus everything it wears), named "Cloned State #1 (...)", "Cloned State #2 (...)", and so on. That can be more states than the State list shows when a weapon is equipped. Each clone is locked to its own state, starts on frame 0, and has its face reset to Blink, but it can still animate within that state. The clones are placed directly above the original in the Layer Panel.

Clone Layer Frames

Creates one layer per frame of the current state, named "Cloned Frame #1 (...)" and so on. Each clone is frozen on its frame and cannot animate. On an imported multi-frame GIF, every frame becomes its own Picture layer.

Pictures, chat balloons, and name tags have no states, so Clone Layer States answers with "The selected image doesn't have states!". Clone Layer Frames gives a similar message for chat balloons, name tags, and single-frame pictures. If nothing is selected, both ask you to select an image from the stage first.

Rasterize and Explode for hand-made poses

• Rasterize Layer (Ctrl + R) flattens the current frame into a single Picture layer called "Raster Layer (...)". The original stays where it was. The copy no longer animates, which is exactly what you want for a pose you intend to freeze. Very large layers, over 2,800 pixels wide or tall, cannot be rasterized.
• Explode Layer (Ctrl + T) splits the current frame into its separate sprite pieces, each becoming a Picture layer named "Exploded Piece #1 (...)" and so on. The original is kept. Use it to nudge an arm, tilt a weapon, or swap a hand, then hide the original layer.

Both commands put their result 5 pixels right of and below the original. Combine them with the Transform Tool (Tools > Use Transform Tool, or press B) to rotate and scale pieces into poses the game never had.

Animating effects, monsters, pictures, and maps

• Effects, skills, monsters, NPCs, pets, morphs, and cash items have the same State, frame box, and Animate controls. Their state names come from the game data, so a monster might offer "Stand", "Move", "Hit 1", and "Die 1".
• An imported GIF with more than one frame shows a frame box and Animate, and plays with the GIF's own frame delays.
• Chat balloons that have several frames get a Frame box and Animate too. Name tags never animate.
• Maps loaded from Window > Maple Maps have an Auto animate map layers checkbox. Tick it before pressing Load Map to start every map layer animating; afterwards, switch individual layers on or off with their own Animate box.

What carries over into exports

The Animate checkboxes only control the canvas preview. File > Save Animation always includes every frame of the selected layer's current state, whether Animate is ticked or not. The sprite sheets go further: Normal Sprite Sheet exports every standard pose, and Sprite Sheet with Face Expressions every expression. A few details surprise people:

• Save Animation exports one layer, the selected one. To animate several layers together, see Making MapleStory Music Video Scenes.
• For a character, the face stays on its current Face State and face frame in a GIF or SWF; Animate Face is not included. Sprite Sheet with Face Expressions is the export that covers every expression.
• "Standing 1", "Standing 2", and "Alert" are exported back and forth (frames 0, 1, 2, 1, 0), the way the original BannedStory did, even though the canvas preview loops them forward.

Formats, transparency, and file names are explained in Exporting Your Work.

When animation doesn't behave

I ticked Animate and nothing moves.

The state probably has a single frame. Check the frame box: if it cannot go above 0, pick another state. Also make sure the layer is not hidden in the Layer Panel.

The face doesn't change while the body animates.

The face is a separate track. Tick Animate Face as well.

An attack pose is missing.

The equipped weapon decides which attacks are listed. A one-handed sword won't offer two-handed swings; try another weapon or hide it.

Clone Layer States made far more layers than I expected.

It makes one layer for every state in the character's sprite data, not just the ones in the State list. Press Ctrl + Z once to undo the whole batch. If you only need a few poses, set the State and use Clone Layer (Ctrl + C) or Clone Layer Frames instead.