I have a question for a niche group of people.

eclectech

@david_chisnall The nice easy manipulation of vectors is one of the things I'm struggling to find, but I am on a mission, so will let you know if I find anything.

eLearningTechie

@david_chisnall @eclectech I don't know how https://friction.graphics compares to Flash or Animate as I've not used Flash in the last two decades and have never used Animate. I rarely do animation work, but have dabbled with Friction on occasion. It's pretty feature rich, but documentation could be better.

Petra van Cronenburg

@eclectech tagging #askFedi #Flash #Animate to perhaps attract a few more nerds here who can recommend alternatives to you.

Steven Hoefer

@eclectech Watching this closely. Been looking for exactly this for years.

eclectech

@troublewithwords Yeah, I've stuck with Animate because I needed other Adobe stuff for my work, but I think I could replace everything else now and would love to find a replacement.

eddie

@eclectech Back in the day, Flash was also used for 'rich web sites' that behave more like desktop applications with fancy animations. Microsoft tried to create an alternative with Silverlight ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Silverlight ). It ended within 5 years when HTML5 became popular.

grmon

@eclectech I remember @toonboom and @hypeapp and did you check: https://alternativeto.net/software/adobe-flash

eLearningTechie

@eclectech @david_chisnall Yes, I'd agree. I love Krita for drawing/painting but the animation side seems more confusing than it needs to be IMO. I don't know if there are plugins or add-ons that make it more useful. I kinda gave up and focused on Friction for animations.

eclectech

@NatureMC Thanks!

eclectech

@dreddie Yep, I used to make them!

I loved Flash. I made web sites, games, animations, all manner of interactive widgets. Was great to work with.

David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*)

@eclectech I have a similar issue with non-animated drawing programs. I have been using OnmiGraffle since it came bundled with the first Mac I bought and it's great, but they're increasingly moving to the 'pro' market.

I paid $25 to upgrade to OmniGraffle 3. I'm not. Now the new versions are $75 (upgrade pricing, $150 full price). Except they've moved a bunch of features I use to the Pro version, which is $125 ($250 full price). Oh, there's also a $125/year subscription option, but since I bought OmniGraffle 6 in 2014 and 7 is the latest version, that's a lot more expensive (it does come with the iOS version, but I have zero desire to use an app that is nice on a 43" monitor and a bit of a struggle on a 16" one on my iPad).

And that's just silly money for a thing I use as infrequently as I use it. I tried InkScape, but I cannot overstate how much rage the UI induced.

Ginkgo

@eclectech I've used Tumult's Hype https://tumult.com/hype/ as a replacement for Flash for web animations, and they have a free trial if you have a Mac. There is some overlap, though nothing quite matches Flash's old vector tools. The nice thing is you can easily mix and match bitmap and SVG components, and the output can be tweaked in a text editor if need be and it is all in basic web file formats.

slowtiger

@eclectech
Then you understand the horrific touch of dread I had when I learned abput Apple's plans to make Logic and Final Cut subscription-based.

eclectech

@grmon I hadn't seen that, will take a look, thanks.

The main thing for me is the UI though, which doesn't tend to be the focus of comparison places, which are mainly focused on output. The output isn't such a big deal for me as I already use FFMPG for most of that side of things; so as long as I can grab the frames I'm good!

slowtiger

@eclectech
Yes, Moho handles bitmaps as easily as verctors. I even have characters which are part vector, part bitmap, or even video (mov).
The timeline will look instantly familiar.

Feel free to ask me any question per mail, or directly in the Moho forum: https://lostmarble.net/forum/

grmon

@eclectech just took a look. Toonbooms licence model is subscription crap. But I remember my switch from flash to hype having a rather flat learning curve. Happy to help.

David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*)

@eclectech @eLearningTechie

I just tried Krita for five minutes. I could not work out how to draw two shapes with a line connecting them. That's the thing I do most often in a vector-drawing tool. OmniGraffle 3 had a really nice magnet model, 6 made it worse but still okay.

eclectech

@grmon Ah, that sounded promising, but I don't have a Mac (realise that should have been in my initial list now). Will have a look at the others on the alternativeto site though, just in case...

Ryan

@eclectech I wish I had answers for you. Any chance you were part of the Flashkit community back in the day?

eLearningTechie

@david_chisnall For vector drawing Inkscape is my go to tool.