Parallax Scrolling

Hi everyone.
I’ve been wondering if there is an easy way of making a Parallax Scrolling Effect on the background?
I know how to make the background move, but I don’t know if it’s possible to make it loop somehow?
For example a plane flight with passing clouds.

Thanks :slight_smile:

@yazoozay Hi, welcome to the forums. Hmm, unfortunately you would have to think out of the box for now as there are no embedded features for that

Here’s my suggestion:

  1. Create a master Pencil2D project. This file will contain all the separate animation elements which you have to create separately, for now it will be blank.
  2. Create another Pencil2D file only to animate the background. Import the BG once, resize the camera to the size of the BG, now import the same BG again but put it adjacent to the first one.
  • If you put it to the right, when you use the camera the motion will be seen from right to left. conversely if you put the second bg to the left, the motion will be see from left to right.
  • Once you’ve decided the motion direction select the camera, determine the length of your loop (e.g 24 frames = 1 second at 24fps) go to the last frame and insert a camera keyframe.
  • Then move from the first background to the second copy of the bg.
  • Later export the result as an image sequence (PNG) to preserve transparency and import it back into the master project.
  • Note: The background should be seamless for this to work. That means the left and right parts of the image should fit correctly. To easily get texture wrapping use a free bitmap editor like Krita or Gimp
  1. Do the same with the clouds or any other element you want “looped”, the key here is using the camera which comes interpolates the motion linearly (currently we can’t change the easing, but for continuous loops it works fine :+1: )
  2. Make sure each element you animate with the camera has the same size as the master project and you animated it in the spot you want it to be seen in the final movie. This will help to avoid you reanimating in the master scene. Note: It’s useful to use a layout guide or mockup screen as a reference so all your elements are properly placed in relation to another when you do this.

For now this is the only way to have sort of “motion tweening” in Pencil2D to help you looping

Thinking of each Pencil2D project as a either a scene or a single animation container can help create more complex animation. What matters is the result.

Later on we’ll be looking for ways to import Pencil2D project files into other project files more easily, so importing image sequences as exchange files is encouraged for now.

Thanks for the quick and detailed answer. That seems as an alternative for now, but it would be great if someday there is a chance for making it easier tho :slight_smile:

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