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OpenToonz

The studio 2D animation program: hand-drawn and cut-out animation with the Xsheet, scan cleanup, ink and paint, and node-based effects. New in r16.3.

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OpenToonz
Menu 2D Animation → OpenToonz
Version 1.8.0 (built by Animux, new in r16.3)
Command opentoonz
Good for Intermediate
Files .tnz scenes with .tlv, .pli and raster levels; renders PNG/TIFF sequences and video
Licence BSD-3-Clause
Website opentoonz.github.io
Self-test animux-selftest opentoonz

OpenToonz is the open-source version of Toonz, the 2D animation software used in studios, among them Studio Ghibli, whose edition it is based on. It covers the whole traditional 2D pipeline: draw or scan the drawings, clean up the lines, paint them, time them on the Xsheet, add effects and render.

New in r16.3

OpenToonz is on Animux from release r16.3. Debian has no OpenToonz package, so Animux builds version 1.8.0 from its source code (package animux-opentoonz, installed in /opt/animux/opentoonz).

Start it#

2D Animation → OpenToonz, or type opentoonz. The first start copies OpenToonz's brushes, templates and settings to ~/.config/OpenToonz; that takes a few seconds.

The Startup window opens on top:

  1. Keep the project sandbox (OpenToonz's practice project), or click New Project... for a real one.
  2. Click Create a New Scene, type a Scene Name and click Create Scene.

Untick Show this at startup if you do not want this window every time.

The main parts#

Part What it is
Rooms (tabs top right) ready-made window layouts: Drawing, Timeline, Cleanup, InknPaint, Xsheet, …
Viewer the canvas; the red frame is the camera
Xsheet / Timeline columns are layers, rows are frames: which drawing is shown on which frame
Level Strip all drawings of the current level
FX Schematic effects as connected nodes (Windows → Schematic)

A level is a set of drawings (one character, one prop). OpenToonz has three kinds: Toonz Raster (.tlv, pencil-like lines with separate ink and paint), Toonz Vector (.pli, editable lines) and plain Raster (.tif, .png).

A first drawing#

  1. In the Drawing room, click the cell of frame 1 in column Col1.
  2. Press B for the Brush and draw in the viewer. OpenToonz makes a new level for it.
  3. Click frame 2 and draw the next pose. Onion skin (View → Onion Skin) shows the frame before.
  4. File → Save All (Ctrl+S). The scene goes to scenes/, the drawings to drawings/ of the project.
  5. Render → Output Settings to choose the format and folder, then Render → Render (Ctrl+Shift+R). Files go to the project's outputs/ folder.

A ready-made sample project is in /usr/share/animux/samples/opentoonz/animux-lines; animux-selftest opentoonz renders it.

Render without the window#

OpenToonz renders with tcomposer. After you have started OpenToonz once:

LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/opt/animux/opentoonz/lib/opentoonz \
  /opt/animux/opentoonz/bin/tcomposer ~/.config/OpenToonz/stuff/sandbox/scenes/myscene.tnz -o /tmp/out.png

This writes /tmp/out.0001.png, /tmp/out.0002.png, … one file per frame. On a server without a screen, put QT_QPA_PLATFORM=offscreen in front.

When to use something else#

  • Simple frame-by-frame drawing, for beginners and schools: Pencil2D.
  • Animation by moving shapes and bones with automatic in-betweens: Synfig.
  • Painterly animation with brushes and textures: Krita.

Help: the OpenToonz manual at opentoonz.readthedocs.io.