Animation Software

We all love cartoons, regardless of age. When we are little children we love them because they are designed for children to understand them and love them. When we grow up we like them because they remind us of our childhood and that brings a feeling of nostalgia in our hearts. When we have children we enjoy cartoons for their sake and watch them with the same happiness as ever. Some people never lose their minds and hearts of children and then they produce animation films. They make the heroes and characters that they imagine come to life one by one with the help of animation software. That is what people use nowadays to make cartoons and animations, not drawings as they used to in the past. It has been a long time since the first animation was invented. First, there were the strip magazines that told the story of a characters by using drawings with funny bubbles that contained the characters' words. Then the Lumiere brothers invented the cinema and the cinema film and that was the beginning of animations, too. They worked on the same principle as movies did: if you show at least 24 frames per second, the eye gets the impression of movement. Only in animation they did not use photos, but drawings. In time, things evolved in this field, too, and now most animations are made on computers, using animation software. You only have to use your imagination and create new characters and follow a story.

Of course, nowadays there are different software programs that allow you to create animation movies. Some of the software is for free, some is shareware and some is for purchase only. Then there is the difference between the animation productions themselves: 2D animations, 3D animations and photo animation.

Here is a list with animation software you can easily find on the internet:

2D Animation Software: Toon Boom Studio 4, Animationish, Flip Boom, Flash, After Effects, Pencil, Synfig, CreaToon, Toon Boom Digital Pro, Toon Boom Studio Express, Swish, Ulead Gif Animator, TV Paint, Plastic Animation Paper, Motion Studio, Pro Motion.


3D animation software: 3D Studio Max, Maya, Lightwave, Blender, Anim8tor, Swift 3D

Photograph animation software: iStopMotion, Morpheus.

In the following lines I will detail only one software from each category. However you can find details about all of them on www.animationprograms.biz.



Toon Boom Studio 4 is a rich animation software with all the possible features available. The interface is a bit upgraded comparing with the previous versions, but it still offers that familiar and comfortable feeling of old-school animation made of pencil and paper drawings , now transferred on the computer monitor, performing a charming and comfortable transition for traditional animators. There is an inconvenient - the plug in enhancements can be a little bit difficult to learn and it can take you some time until you master them, but it is worth the waiting and the effort of learning something completely new: the results will be spectacular. You can use this software to produce animation films that you can publish on the internet, as it allows you to create animation movies in flash or HTML format. This software is capable of both traditional and more advanced, futuristic animation. It allows you to bring a lot of resources. This latest version also offers some unique features of  brush shapes and feathered edges. The timeline is now improved and has suffered a serious upgrade. In conclusion I recommend this software for the people who still miss Walt Disney' s cartoons atmosphere but want more advanced tools.

3D Studio Max has been used mainly in producing 3D video games, but some companies however use it also in producing film and television programs. It offers you models to work on in order to get the best 3D animation you can possibly want. But its finest features and the ones that made it so demanded all over the world are the numerous plug-ins available. Some of them are spectacular and allow you to obtain impressive visual effects like the volumetric smoke or the motion of liquids. This was the first animation software that allowed its users to turn the results of their animations into Flash films.



As for photo animation software the best example is Morpheus. it is not just a singular example of photo animation software , but a whole suite of versions. You can find it as shareware on the internet, that is you can use it for free during a period of thirty days of free trial, with the possibility of purchasing it afterward, if it convinced you of its qualities. The software is compatible with all versions of Windows and can support different languages, not only English. Morpheus is easy and safe to install on your computer and provides you with amazing animation tools for the photos on your computer. The version Morpheus Photo Morpher is used for special effects in animation movies. It helps you transform a person or an object into another one or even combines two things in an interesting manner right in front of you, with spectacular results. These merged photos are further used to obtain animation movies in different formats. The software is easy to use and you can use it at home, without being a specialist. All you need is two digital photos and this creative software. The result seems to be created by special effects professionals directly from Hollywood. For example you can combine the photo of a little girl with that of a puppy and get an interesting combination, a fairy tale character half child-half dog. The latest version of Morpheus Photo Morpher does not contain any spyware or other threat to your computer, so you can download it without  a problem or fear.



So these are just a few examples of animation software you can use to get the best results either for producing cartoons, video games or even commercials. They are different and with different levels of complexity and particular features. All you have to do is search and find the best one for you and your needs, the software that suits you and your purposes best.