@allthingsminecraft Sorry to hear you’ve had this issue. If you can reproduce this consistently, believe it or not, your experience increases the probability of fixing the bug tenfold.
It is in everyone’s best interest if you can take some time to describe the reproduction steps that lead to the crash every time. Try to explain what you’re doing as if you were saying it to someone that is computer illiterate. e.g. “open the program this way… > select the layer x > draw on the canvas a closed shape > pick the bucket tool > fill the drawing > the app crashes > etc”
We’ll also ask you to share privately the PCLX project file so the developers can inspect where the problem can be happening along your instructions to reproduce the problem
Other than that here are some tips you can review:
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With a proper gaming computer I assume you’re using Windows 10 as your OS. If you aren’t feel free to skip to the next point. This OS has been known to have issues with ALL third party apps due to increased security protocols in the past year and a half, and that includes Pencil2D. We recommend you also follow this guide to a T: [Guide] How to Train Your Pencil2D (Windows) prior to continuing your work.
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Now I’m also going to assume you’re using the official download binary found at http://pencil2d.org/download which should be labeled as 0.6.4
IF you don’t know which version you are using please visit the menuHelp > About >PressCopy to Clipboardbutton and paste the info on your reply. If you aren’t using 0.6.4 I urge you to download the latest version. -
Since you mention you’re having a crash by using the fill tool I can only think that you are probably using the vector layer (the green colored layers).
In this case I have to say that the vector layers are NOT ready for production. Please do not use them for your work. At the end of the reply I’ll recommend other animation applications with vector capabilities in case you want to use them for a similar workflow to resume your work.
IF you are not using vector layers, but bitmap layers (blue colored layers) then we need to know how exactly you’re applying the color with step by step instructions so the developers can crash their own version 100% and find the problem ASAP. This is important because a new version will come very soon and we want it to be more stable (obviously) -
As a personal & professional recommendation, make several copies of your work file. Don’t save on the same file over and over. Even commercial grade software crashes and corrupts your workfiles. This is a PITA and it’s extremely frustrating.
Unfortunately If Pencil2D keeps crashing like that at some point the file itself could become corrupted and thus unrecoverable. We have a guide to prevent loss of work and recover files due to this behavior as well Pencil2D Project File Corruption Prevention / Partial Recovery Guide
Additional Animation Software Recommendations
You might be used to software like Flash, in that case the only serious recommendation I can provide you so you can finish your work would be to use Opentoonz as a complementary application. It may be more difficult to grasp at first but they have a lot of learning resources on youtube and a proper manual. You would only need to export a PNG image sequence from Pencil2D and import that into Opentoonz. If you’re doing the lineart in Pencil2D, Opentoonz has a tracing feature which should allow you to convert all the PNG images into vector layers.
Then you can continue working only with vector layers if you see fit. If you want to work with bitmap layers, this should be even easier.
I always recommend this playlist for people trying to bridge Pencil2D with opentoonz, just replace the “pencil & paper” step with the work from Pencil2D and instead of scanning use the images exported from Pencil2D and the rest will be the same:
Note: I’m only recommending this to help you finish your work in case you are on a due date for delivery, there are other programs I could recommend but none that are free are as complete and actively developed, except maybe Krita.