Pivot Animator (formerly Pivot Stickfigure Animator and usually shortened to Pivot) is a freeware application that allows users to create stick-figure and sprite animations, and save them in the animated GIF format for use on web pages and the AVI format (in Pivot Animator 3 and later).
Pivot provides a simple, easy to use interface with a few features. It uses fixed length 'sticks' to ensure size consistency during animation.
Video Pivot Animator
Development
First release
The first version of Pivot Animator had several software bugs. Stick figures were limited to one type of stick figure, the default stickman. Animations could be saved in the .PIV (Pivot Project File) or exported as Animated .GIFs (Graphics Interchangeable Format). Users were given few options of image optimization, compression or resizing when saving their animation.
Pivot 2.2
The second major release of the Pivot Stickfigure Animator. This version implemented the 'Stick Figure Builder', which allowed users to create their own stick figure designs saved in the STK format. This allowed a much wider scope of animation choice for Pivot users. It also fixed a few minor bugs, added the buttons to the main interface to bring a stick figure in front or behind other figures, and could automatically check to make sure the user didn't lose any unsaved projects.
Pivot 3.1 Beta
This release was sent intentionally to the Pivot Animation MSN groups for testing but the Beta was leaked from various unofficial sources to the general public. There was an improved interface, with new icons, a better default stickman with bolder arms and legs and a reorganization of the features. New features included the ability to import any image as a sprite to be moved around in the animation like a stick figure. Another added feature was the ability to have multiple backgrounds in an animation. When a user saves a .piv file, the frame rate is saved with it.
Pivot 4.1
Pivot 4.1 beta was released was on January 2, 2013, with new features including.
- Figure opacity
- Extended canvas area
- Multi-select and edit figures
- Stretch segments using the Ctrl key
- Rotate / scale figures using the Alt key
- Image based figure and background selector
- Split a segment into 2 in the figure builder
- Copy and paste frames
- Improved Gif export options and quality
- Avi video export
- Join figures tool
- Png support for sprites and backgrounds
- Keyboard shortcuts
- Multiple languages and the ability to create your own translation
- Multiple frame onion skins (0-9)
- Undo / redo
- Image preview of Stk files when loading figures
Pivot Animator 4.1.10 was released as the "stable" version of 4.1 and is still the latest non-beta version so far (as of October 2015).
Pivot 4.2 was announced on December 23, 2014 followed by a beta release on January 1, 2015. New features include copying and pasting selected stick figures and sprites, a transparent figure builder window, and the ability to export images in the Scalable Vector Graphics format.
Maps Pivot Animator
See also
- List of 2D animation software
References
External links
- Official website
- Pivot Animation Forum
- TheDarkDemon Forum (generally recognized as the largest pivot forum)
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