Animation Paints - My preferred 2D Animation software of choice.

In this first installment of animation paints, I'm gonna get into the nuts and bolts of color theory and why it's important in the realm of both cartoons and anime.

And no, I will not show you my collection of acrylic paints despite the name. Animation Paints is just a label for my color theory posts but I will showcase some of my own cels made during my free time.

This industry doesn't use actual acrylic paints for animation anymore. Now it's all done on the computer through a series of algorithms, hexadecimal color codes, etc. 

This depends on the software you use. Whether it be Toonboom, Adobe Animate, Rectas, Moho, Toonz, or any other animation package you install in your computer.

For me, I primarily use Toonboom Harmony as my 2D animation software. To me, it's the most versatile of all 2D animation software you can have. It's practically an industry standard for cartoons out there.

This here is my 2D animation work environment. 

Not pictured is my second screen: A WACOM ONE pen display. 

Anyhow, why I prefer harmony over the software and what's it got to do with animation paints? 

Like I said, it's the most versatile. Below is an image over the versatility of color.

As you can see here, unlike other software where the colored area needs to have the paint bucket reapplied to said area, Toonboom's color system is more or less a palette based system. Parts of your drawing, or cel is tied to a given color palette in the software. And since that color is tied to that palette, you can change said color by manipulating the value on the palette wheel without using the bucket.  Therefore, you don't need to redo a scene, or apply that paint bucket again when management decides to enforce a color change. The versatility is there in Toon Boom's color palette system. 

This is also handy if you need to help your characters stand out from the background.

Beebe Bluff agrees that Toon Boom is good for color theory

I'll get into more of animation paints as soon as I get more insight, as well as fight off my writers block.