Flipbook

Flipbook is a pixel art animation software that combines standard drawing tools with a Lua scripting environment. You can draw frame-by-frame animations by hand or use code to generate them procedurally.

Projects are saved in a custom .pxrt format, and animations can be exported to GIF, Frame can be exported to PNG.

Features

Canvas & Tools

• Standard drawing tools: Pencil, Eraser, and Bucket Fill.
• Customizable color palettes.
• Zoom in/out and Move Canvas (Pan) for navigation.
• Grid overlay.
• Onion Skinning: See a transparent overlay of the previous frame while drawing.
• Copy Onion: copy previous frame to next one.

Timeline & Playback

• Add and Delete frames.
• Set specific Frame Duration (in milliseconds) to control timing.
• Real-time playback.

System

• Built-in Lua Code Editor.
• Undo functionality.
• Export to .GIF or .PNG.

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Building from Source

To build Flipbook, you need CMake and Visual Studio 2022 (MSVC) installed.

1. Open a terminal in the project directory.
2. Configure the project: cmake -B build
3. Build the project in Release mode: cmake --build build --config Release
4. The executable will be generated in the build/Release directory (or build/ depending on your OS).

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Scripting & API Reference

You can automate animation using the built-in code editor. You have access to the standard Lua libraries (math..etc) and the custom functions listed below.

Setup Rules

To initialize a script correctly, you must call these functions in this specific order at the top of your code:

1. defineCanvas(width, height)
2. defineFrames(total_frames)

API Functions

Initialization

• defineCanvas(width, height): Initializes the canvas. Width and height must be non-negative. Call this first.
• defineFrames(total_frames): Initializes the animation buffer size. Call this second.

Drawing & State

• setPixel(x, y, color_table): Draws a single pixel. The color_table must specify RGB values using keys. Example: {r=255, g=0, b=0}.
• getPixel(x, y): Returns a table containing the color data of a pixel.
• getWidth(): Returns the canvas width.
• getHeight(): Returns the canvas height.
• setFrameDelay(delay_ms): Sets the delay for the current frame in milliseconds.
• setCurrentFrame(frame_index): Targets a specific frame to draw on (1-based index).
• copyRegion(x, y, w, h): Copies pixels from the current frame into an internal buffer. Coordinates must be positive.
• pasteRegion(x, y): Pastes the clipboard contents onto any frame at (x, y).
• moveRegion(x, y, w, h, target_x, target_y): Moves a block of pixels from one location to another within the current frame.

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Example Script

Here is a simple script to create a moving dot animation on a 32x32 canvas.

-- 1. Initialize
local w = 32
local h = 32
defineCanvas(w, h)

-- 2. Set total frames
local frames = 15
defineFrames(frames)

-- 3. Draw Loop
for i = 1, frames do
    setCurrentFrame(i)
    
    -- Clear background to black
    for x = 0, w-1 do
        for y = 0, h-1 do
            setPixel(x, y, {r=0, g=0, b=0})
        end
    end
    
    -- Draw a red pixel moving to the right
    local x_pos = i * 2
    setPixel(x_pos, 16, {r=255, g=0, b=0})
    
    -- Set speed
    setFrameDelay(100)
end

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Animation Showcase