Adobe Animate

Start by deciding what you need to ship: a banner, a character short, a UI screen, or an explainer. In Animate, create an HTML5 Canvas document, set your stage size, and drop brand assets in as SVG or PNG. Convert artwork to Symbols so you can reuse and animate cleanly. Build motion with classic or motion tweens, add easing for polish, and use masks for reveals. Add interaction by placing labels on the timeline and wiring a click handler in the Actions panel (JavaScript for Canvas). Preview in the browser, iterate with the Output panel, then export variants: HTML5 for ads, MP4 for social, or animated GIF for email. Use Publish Settings to bundle only what you need and enable high‑DPI scaling without redrawing anything.

For character work, sketch or import vector parts and organize them into a clear layer hierarchy. Rig the puppet with bones and mesh deformation so limbs bend naturally, and fine‑tune weights for trouble areas like shoulders and knees. Animate inside symbols to build cycles (walk, blink, idle), then drive timing with onion skinning and pose‑to‑pose keyframes. Drop in voice or music, sync mouth shapes by scrubbing the waveform, and automate repetitive lip passes with labeled frames. Keep everything tidy in the Library—props, outfits, and expressions as separate symbols—so swapping rigs or reusing animations across episodes takes seconds. When you’re done, export as video for platforms, as a transparent MOV for compositing, or as a sprite sheet for runtime playback. more