Show HN: I made a free animator. Think Adobe Illustrator but for animation

Post by raytopia » Tue, Mar 12, 2024, 4:39 PM UTC

junto wrote: post #13

Back in the day I used to do quite a lot of Macromedia Flash work. It’s uncannily similar but a modern take. I’ve often wondered why no one has come up with a new product in this space. I think the long term demise of Flash has put off anyone even trying. There are so many great uses for animations on the web, even if we don’t need full blown user interfaces of them and intro screens like we did back in 2002. Great j…

Post by javier_e06 » Tue, Mar 12, 2024, 4:42 PM UTC

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #135

javier_e06 wrote: post #86

It passed my first test: "Type hello world and make it bounce for 5 seconds." The second test is: "save it as a gif" I could not do that because I need to create an account. I am weary of sites that lock in my work. Perhaps it would be a good hook-and-reel method to allow one grace save to ensure that what people create in an anonymous trial can be used somewhere else. All my kids and I know how to use Paint Tool Sai…

You can save to file ('export', to use Trangram's nomenclature) without creating an account. This includes Trangram's native .tg format, as well as animated GIF.

Post by samstave » Tue, Mar 12, 2024, 4:55 PM UTC

trangram wrote: post #14

shubhamjain wrote: post #4

This is awesome. Great job! I love the simplicity of the whole thing. I was able to figure out the tool in a minute. Compare that to professional software, which can have a scary complexity. I think it'd be a great educational tool. Kids would love to experiment with it.

Your words mean a lot to me. In designing and implementing Trangram, ease-of-use ranks high on my list of priorities, alongside functionality and safety. Just as you mentioned, one of my primary motivations was to facilitate the creation of educational materials, which I was particularly inspired by experiences while watching The Power Of A Mathematical Picture https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vnMT70HOxc&list=PLOxODW…

Post by foooorsyth » Tue, Mar 12, 2024, 5:10 PM UTC

karaterobot wrote: post #141

jaysonelliot wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO, Flash died because it didn't play nice with the conventions of the web. There were workarounds, but generally it broke all of the things HTML could do, like being searchable & selectable, navigable with a keyboard, built of code you could inspect, addressable with a direct link, even working with the browser's back button. The actual animations and (sometimes) beautiful interfaces were not the problem. People ge…

I always thought Flash died because Apple didn't want people to be able to write and execute arbitrary code in an app on their phones. That it posed a security risk, a stability risk, and potentially a business risk (as it could allow people to circumvent the limitations they'd imposed on, say, distribution and payments). Is that wrong?

Post by swatcoder » Tue, Mar 12, 2024, 5:12 PM UTC

tempoponet wrote: post #147

swatcoder wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Generally, the missing features you mention were inconsequential to decision-makers (outside of some ideological devs) and many of them were being gradually addressed by Macromedia/Adobe anyway. Flash died because Microsoft was agressingly nipping at Adobe on the commercial side with Silverlight, because standard bodies were finally chipping away at its feature advantages with long-needed improvements to HTML, CS…

I'm surprised you bothered to mention SilverLight. It was Microsoft's intent, sure, but did it ever have any uptake? It's more of a curiosity or footnote than a relevant factor.