Tutorial - CharMaker Utility

CharMaker is a wizard like utility for creation of human like characters. The utility is unfinished and used mostly by us to create characters. This tutorial topic is only for ADVANCED USERS who are not afraid of challenge. Basically the utility works pretty good if you strictly follow the rules but may cause unpredictable results if you do not.

You can download the utility here: CharMaker

You will also need Inkscape to proceed

1. Start Inkscape and create a picture of your human like character. The character should be similar to other characters in our library - standing on 2 legs, half turned to his right.
2. Ungroup everything (apply CTRL-U shortcut to every group). There should not be any groups in your picture before you proceed.
3. You need to create groups using CTRL-G shortcut for every character's part. You should select all the pieces related to a part and use CTRL-G shortcut. You should rename them using "Object/Object Properties" menu and setting one of the following ids:
   • WCM_LeftLeg
   • WCM_RightLeg
   • WCM_Body
   • WCM_LeftArm
   • WCM_RightArm
   • WCM_Head
   • WCM_LeftEye
   • WCM_RightEye
   • WCM_Mouth
4. Optionally you can add more groups beginning from WCM_ like WCM_Hair etc.
5. Save your picture to the hard drive
6. Run the following command: charmaker.exe <yourpicture>.svg On initial screen click on the character's origin, then click Next For every part click on part's origin, then click Next. Optionally for non standard parts you may want to indicate their proper parent. For example if you want to use Hair as a separate part (by creation of WCM_Hair group in Inkscape) then you may want to indicate that Hair's parent is Head After you are done the folder should be created. Take a look for .cpp in this folder and compile the code in Web Cartoon Maker. You should see nice walking action. Update the following pictures to get a proper winking and speaking actions: "LeftEye_Wink1.svg", "LeftEye_Wink2.svg", "RightEye_Wink1.svg", "RightEye_Wink2.svg", "Mouth_Speak_A.svg", "Mouth_Speak_E.svg", "Mouth_Speak_M.svg", "Mouth_Speak_O.svg", "Mouth_Speak_W.svg" Recompile the script, clear cache and you should see nice walking speaking and winking actions.

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