a few very useful options for the onion skin source would be:
- Bezier paths
- Style image
- Any layer
- alpha layer
would allow it to be used as kind of a grease pencil/guide layer for time-based work
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Manual Load covers 'any layer'.
By using another layer to set it up, you can get style and alpha. You could do bezier that way if you build a simple paint synth preset to paint it in that other layer.
thanks, maybe my issue is that i don't understand how to use it properly.
manual load loads the current canvas as onion skin but in my workflow i have some time-based process in each of the layers (could be from a transition frame or generative or some feedback). i'd like to have that process running on its own and do a kind of rotoscoping over it. since i'm using the canvas as a staging area, i can't also use it as an onion skin.
i've tried to use 'canvas to source' in a similar fashion while using the style buffer for painting reference but my problem is that this operation only sends the current layer in the canvas to source (and not the composite of all layers that i actually see rendered) so again i can't overpaint without bringing in what should just be a reference into the final result
Even if you have alpha compositing on, you could still use another hidden layer as a buffer for what you want to dump into the onion via manual load. Just mute the hidden layer's display in the alpha composite stack.
Another approach is to use Fixed Image IpOp to build your compositing without using the master layer alpha composite.
As I type this I'm realizing that this is probably more difficult than it would have to be when wanting to actually use the alpha layer as a part of the composite in Fixed Image, so i'll think about improving that.
We tend to do more things here inline in the PASeq list rather than use physical alpha composited layers with the layer display stack. It's a whole other world of ways of working. Most people have twisted their brains around how photoshop works so much that they can't conceive of the world working differently. I think when the V5.5.5 features drop it will be more apparent where we are heading, and how it allows you to do similar things in a very different way that also opens up whole new ways of doing things.
thanks, i think i still completely misunderstand how and what 'manual load' does. the only reference i could find is 'Loads the current canvas into the onion skin buffer.' which it does the first time i turn it on but then it does not update with any time-based or process source i load. could you please clarify for my sake how it covers the 'any layer' option
I'm gathering that you want some kind of auto-update thing, while 'manual load' is it happens when you physically run the menu command. So if you were using a hidden layer to build up some custom onion skin display you wanted in that hidden layer, then you would have to physically run that 'manual load' onion skin command ever time you wanted what it displayed to change.
yes, here's my attempt at refining the question:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wuYojw8RZR_mP_ru0IVaTCG4JyZSLnVE/v...
as i was making the video i realized that this is probably a very niche case but it is in conjunction with my other question that had to do with accumulating alpha channels and composited layers on the canvas. when there are a lot of layers, some derived from others through some analysis or feedback, i would just love to have the option to have any one of them (hidden or otherwise) just show up as an onion skin.
the more general point is that now there are more and more interesting sources that can inform and affect the canvas, e.g. style, flow, msg, so having a way to preview those sources through some kind of routing mechanism would be very useful to a lot of the workflows i can think of. based on your previous answers it sounds like there is probably already a way to do this using the timeline and fixed images, i just have to think of a way to implement what i am imagining.
I think it is becoming obvious that the Composite popup in IpOp effects needs to be split out into the actual composite algorithm, and then alternative routing destinations.
So Replace Selection is buried inside of Composite right now, because that was the only place to sneak it in when we snuck that feature in. But you would like to also send to style, another layer (?),another layer alpha(?), source (?),image brush, in addition to selection, and of course the normal put it in the current layer.
But you want to be able to run a composite algorithm between what is coming out of the effect, and the destination. You can do this now for the current layer, but you really want to have the option for all of the different destinations.
That is going to be a V6 thing, but something to look forward to.
In more immediate thoughts i am thinking about Style for an Onion Skin option. The symmetry plays well, so probably will be added soon.