Cameras

A camera is a shape that frames an area of the board, drawn as an outline in its color. Don't confuse it with the canvas camera, the view you use to move around the board. When a camera becomes the active camera, the canvas camera moves to fit it.

What you can do with a camera:

• Export its area at any resolution: as an image, a video or GIF of the animation, or a printed page, at the size in pixels you choose. See Shape dimensions and resolution and Exporting a camera.
• Attach shapes: titles, legends, or overlays parented to the camera travel and scale with it.
• Present the board: step through the cameras in the order of the Cameras panel, and the canvas camera moves from one area to the next.
• Film through a lens: shader filters change what the camera films, such as blurs, color grading, distortions or generated backgrounds, in the editor, the Player and exports. See Lens.
• Animate the view: Active Camera blocks choose which camera the animation is seen through, and a camera can move and zoom over time. See Animating cameras.
• Guide viewers in the Player: a viewer can start on a camera, stay inside one, follow the animation's cameras, and step through them as slides. See Player interaction.

Creating a camera

A camera is created in one of four ways. The first three use the Camera tool, in the board objects multi-button of the Tools panel:

• Click on an empty spot: a default camera, 1600 by 900 with a locked 16:9 ratio, centered on the point.
• Click on a shape: a camera the size of the shape's bounding box, so it frames the shape exactly. The shape under the pointer is highlighted before you click.
• Drag: a camera with the area and the ratio you draw.
• New, in the Cameras tab of the Side panel: a default camera at the center of the current view.

Every new camera:

• Is named Camera 1, Camera 2, and so on. A pasted or duplicated camera also gets the next number.
• Is drawn as an outline in the color the Attributes panel shows while the Camera tool is active.
• Starts with an export size equal to its size on the board.
• Goes into a frame only when it fits inside it. A larger camera stays outside, in the same place. To take a camera out of its frame, select it and click Extract from frame.

Cameras panel

The Cameras tab of the Side panel lists every camera on the board and holds the controls that work on all of them.

Camera list

One row per camera, under the heading Canvas cameras. Each row has, from left to right:

• Reorder handle: drag it to change the order of the cameras. The first camera in the list is the one playback uses when the animation has no Active Camera blocks.
• Camera color: the color of the camera's outline on the board. Click it to change it.
• Name: click it to make the camera the active camera, and the canvas camera zooms to it. Click the active camera's name to rename it.
• Select camera: hover it to highlight the camera on the board, so you can tell which one it is without selecting it. Click it to select the camera, hold Shift while you click to add it to the current selection, or double-click it to zoom to it.

The order of the list is the order of a presentation. Put the cameras in the sequence you want to show, then step through them with Next camera ↓ and Previous camera ↑ while nothing is selected:

• Each step makes the next camera active, and the canvas camera moves to it with the transition set in Camera settings.
• The steps wrap around: after the last camera comes the first.
• Panning or zooming away from the active camera leaves no camera active. The next step, with either key, returns to the camera you left.

New camera

New, at the bottom of the tab, adds the default camera at the center of the current view, as described in Creating a camera.

Camera settings

Camera settings, at the top of the tab, sets how the canvas camera behaves when it follows a camera.

• Camera padding: the space the canvas camera leaves around the active camera's outline when it moves to fit it. It is measured in screen pixels and starts at 24.

• Passepartout color: the color drawn over the board outside the active camera, to mask what is not in the view.

• Passepartout opacity: how opaque that mask is. It starts at 0, so no mask shows until you raise it.

• Transition duration: how long the canvas camera takes to move to a camera you pick yourself:

  • In the editor: by clicking its name in the camera list, or with Next camera ↓ and Previous camera ↑.
  • In the Player: when a viewer steps through the cameras.

  During an animation, the view switches cameras without this transition.

• Fade camera transitions: when on, that transition fades the view out and back in instead of flying over the board.

• Reset Settings: returns every setting to its default.

Hide cameras

Hide cameras, in the header of the tab, hides the camera outlines while you work. While it is on, cameras can't be selected on the board, but they still work in presentations, animations, and exports. Picking the Camera tool turns it off.

Selecting and dragging a camera

A camera is only an outline, so clicks inside it go to the shapes it frames:

• Select: click its outline.
• Move: once it is selected, drag from any point inside it. The camera moves, not the shape under the pointer. Dragging the outline resizes it instead.
• Click the shapes inside: a click inside the camera selects the shape under the pointer, even while the camera is selected. A click on an empty spot clears the selection.

Shape dimensions and resolution

A camera exports its area at the resolution you choose. Its outline sets the area, and the Attributes panel sets the size in pixels of the exported image, or of each frame of a video.

• W and H, the width and height, are the size of the outline on the board, in board units.
• Exported image width and Exported image height are the size, in pixels, of any image or video frame exported through the camera.
• Zoom ties the two together: the exported size is the camera size multiplied by the zoom. A camera 800 units wide with a zoom of 2 exports an image 1600 pixels wide.

A normal export takes its size from the shapes on the board, times the scale set in the export settings, so a small drawing gives a small picture. With a camera, the same area can come out as a thumbnail or as a print-ready image. See Exports.

Sizing

How a camera resizes depends on Locked Ratio:

• Off: the camera resizes like any other shape, and its export size grows or shrinks with it.
• On: the export size is frozen. Resizing the camera changes its zoom instead, and typing a new export size changes the resolution without moving or resizing the camera.

To export an area of the board at a chosen resolution:

1. With Locked Ratio off, resize the camera until it frames the area.
2. Turn Locked Ratio on.
3. Type the Exported image width or Exported image height you need.

Typing a Zoom also keeps the export size, and grows or shrinks the camera around its pivot, which sits at its center by default.

Shapes parented to a camera

Shapes attached to a camera follow it and keep their place in its view, so they work as an overlay, or HUD, over what the camera shows, such as titles or legends. Attach them with Parent to camera, and detach them with Unparent from camera.

Attached shapes:

• Follow the camera: they move when it moves, and scale when it is resized or zoomed, also during its Position Animation and Camera Zoom blocks.
• Stay editable: they can still be selected and edited on their own.
• Show wherever the camera is used: in the Player and in exports.
• Go with the camera: deleting the camera deletes them too. Unparent them first to keep them.

Lens

A lens runs what the camera films through a stack of filters, such as blurs, color grading, distortions or generated backgrounds.

• Find the filters: they live in the Lens section of the Attributes panel.
• Order them: they apply from the top of the stack down. Drag a filter's grip to move it.
• Choose what's filtered: the lens filters only the shapes stacked behind the camera. Shapes stacked above it draw on top unfiltered, such as sharp titles over a blurred background. To choose a shape's side, move it above or below the camera with the arranging commands.
• See the result: it shows over the camera area on the board, in the Player and in exports, always with this layering.

Adding filters

Add filter, at the top of the Lens section, lists the filters in groups. Type to search them by name.

• Start: Blank, a filter that passes the picture through unchanged, ready for your own code, and From file…, which adds the filters saved in a lens file.
• Adjust: color and tone, such as Levels, Duotone or LUT grading.
• Blur: Blur, Lens blur, Motion blur, Radial blur, Tilt-shift and Zoom blur.
• Distort: bends or breaks up the picture, such as Fisheye, Ripple or Kaleidoscope.
• Stylize: looks such as Film grain, Halftone dots, Pixelate or Vignette.
• Backgrounds: generated effects such as gradients, noise and patterns. See Backgrounds.

A new filter goes to the end of the stack, except a background, which goes first so it receives what the camera films. See Camera filters.

The filter stack

Once the lens has a filter, a Filters header sits above the stack:

• Lens settings: opens a box with:
  • Preview: shows the lens on the board while you edit.
  • Show code: opens the code pane, where you can edit the shader code of any filter in the stack, including the templates.
  • Download lens: saves the whole stack as a lens file.
• Lens: turns the whole lens on or off in the editor, the Player and exports.
• Remove all filters: empties the stack.

Each filter in the stack is a row:

• Grip: drag it to move the filter up or down the order.
• Name: the template's name, or Custom once its code changes. Click it to rename the filter.
• Filter settings: opens the filter's settings under the row, and makes it the filter the code pane shows.
• On or off: turns the filter on or off.
• Remove filter.

The eyedropper of the Lens section copies another camera's lens onto the selected cameras.

Filter settings

A filter's settings box holds:

• Reset: puts the controls back to the template's values. It shows while a value differs from them.
• Download filter: saves this filter as a lens file.
• Edit controls: changes the filter controls, their labels, ranges and types, or adds and removes them, for filters that run your own code.
• Lens controls: the first ones in the box. The lens applies them around the filter's code, so they work the same on every filter, including one with your own code:
  • Mix: fades the filter in, from 0, where it changes nothing, to 1, its full effect. It's made for bringing a filter in or out gradually: animate it with an Attributes Animation block, since the filter's on/off switch can't change over time. See Animating cameras.
  • Edge overscan, on the filters that warp or blur: these filters pull the picture inward or blend it with its surroundings, so near the camera's edge they need the part of the board just outside it. Without it, an empty band shows along the edge. Edge overscan films that extra band, as a percentage of the camera's shorter side, and the result still covers only the camera area.
• Filter controls: the ones after them, inputs for the variables in the filter's shader code.
  • Adjust the shader: change or animate a value without touching the code.
  • Set a value: with a field that fits its type, such as a number with a slider, a checkbox, a list of choices, a color, a point or an image.
  • Define your own: with Edit controls. See Defining a filter's controls.

Backgrounds

A background filter draws a generated picture in the camera area. Its Picture choice places what the camera films relative to that effect:

• Over the effect, the default: the filmed shapes stay on top, and the effect fills what they leave transparent.
• Under the effect: the effect covers the filmed shapes.
• Hidden: only the effect shows.

Code pane

Each filter is a shader, and the code pane shows its code beside the camera.

• Operation:
  1. Turn on Show code in the lens settings, and open the settings of the filter to edit.
  2. Click the pane to start editing, or double-click the camera.
  3. Type or paste the code.
  4. Click on the board to finish.
• Result: after a short pause in typing:
  • Code that works: becomes what the lens draws.
  • Code with errors: is kept as a draft while the lens keeps drawing the last working version. The error shows on the failing line, on the filter's row, and as Lens code has errors on the camera.
  • Template filters: changing their code turns them into Custom filters.
• Arranging the pane: its header picks the filter it shows and puts the pane above, below, left or right of the camera. Drag its outer edge to make it wider or narrower. While it is open, the Code and Text Style sections set its look.
• Tip: the pane never changes what the camera films. Board exports draw it beside the camera while it is open, and the Player leaves it out.

Lens files

A lens file (.lens.json) saves filters to reuse them on other cameras and boards.

• Download lens, in the lens settings, saves the whole stack, named after the camera.
• Download filter, in a filter's settings, saves that filter alone.
• From file…, under Start in Add filter, adds every filter of a lens file to the end of the stack.
• A lens file keeps each filter's code, controls and values, without their images. A filter with image controls asks you to choose its images again.

Where the lens shows

• On the board: the lens shows when Camera lenses in UI settings, the camera's Lens, its Preview, and at least one filter are on. Turn Preview off to hide this camera's lens while you edit, or Camera lenses off to hide every lens. With Only on the active camera on, in UI settings, only the active camera shows its lens.
• While you move or resize the camera: the lens hides and returns when you release it.
• Overlapping lenses: the lens of the camera in front also filters what the lens behind it draws.
• Player and exports: they show every lens and filter that is on, whatever Preview, Camera lenses, or Only on the active camera say, with the last code that worked. The video and GIF export dialog warns about filters whose code has errors, since their last working code is what draws.

Attributes

A selected camera shows these sections of the Attributes panel.

Camera

The name, export size, aspect ratio, position, size, zoom, opacity, and color of the camera.

• Name: the camera's name, as listed in the Cameras tab of the Side panel. Each camera needs its own name, so a name that another camera already has is refused.
• Exported image width: the width, in pixels, of images and videos captured through this camera.
• Exported image height: their height, in pixels.
• Aspect ratio: the proportion of the camera. Type it as a ratio, such as 16 or 16/9, or as a decimal number. The width stays and the height follows.
• Locked Ratio: keeps that proportion while resizing. With it on, changing one exported image size changes the other too. With it off, the camera takes the new proportion.
• X: the horizontal position of the frame on the board.
• Y: the vertical position of the frame.
• W: the width of the frame.
• H: the height of the frame.
• Zoom: the export size divided by the size on the board. Raising it shrinks the camera on the board around its pivot, and the shapes parented to it scale along.
• Opacity: the transparency of the camera's outline on the board.
• Camera color: the color of that outline.

Lens

The camera's lens filters. See Lens.

Code and Text Style

Shown while the lens code pane is open. They set the pane's look: its background, line numbers and line wrapping in Code, and its typography in Text Style.

Actions

Of the actions every shape has, covered in What every shape shares, a camera keeps delete, lock, hide, duplicate, arrange, align, and pivot. Besides those, cameras offer these in the Actions panel.

Parent to camera

Attaches shapes to a camera so they travel with it.

• Operation: select one camera and the shapes to attach, then click Parent to camera.
• Needs: exactly one camera in the selection.
• Result: the shapes belong to the camera and behave as described in Shapes parented to a camera.

Unparent from camera

Detaches shapes from their camera.

• Operation: select the attached shapes and click Unparent from camera.
• Result: they return to the board at their original scale.

Create and edit image

Captures the area the camera marks as an image, at the camera's export size, and opens it for editing so you can choose its format and quality.

• Operation: select one or more cameras and click Create and edit image.
• Result: each camera's view is captured as a PNG at its export size, with no background and no padding, and every camera outline left out of the picture. The capture opens in the compression tool, covered in Media optimization, where you choose one of:
  • Create image shape: adds the result as a new image on the board, to the right of the camera.
  • Download: saves the file. With several cameras, Download Zip saves one zip named after Export name, and Download files saves separate files.
  • Copy: puts the image on the clipboard as a PNG.
• Tip: the camera stays on the board. A capture larger than 96 megapixels is refused: lower the camera's export size.

Exporting a camera

You can export the area a camera marks in three forms:

• As an image, at the camera's export size:
  • With the camera as the only selected shape, Export selection as and Copy selection as, in the Export and Copy submenus of the App menu, render exactly the area it marks, with no padding and no outline. The background and quality come from the image export settings or the copy settings; the scale does not apply, since the export size is the camera's.
  • Create and edit image captures the same area and lets you pick the format and quality.
  • A board image export that includes the camera among other shapes renders the area in place of the camera outline.
• As a video or GIF, when the board has at least one animation block: Export as Video, in the same Export submenu, renders the animation through one camera, or follows the Active Camera blocks when Active camera is chosen. The frame size is the camera's export size times the scale in the video export settings. With Active camera, it is the largest export size among the cameras the animation goes through.
• On paper or as a PDF: with only cameras selected, Print selection for digital and Print selection to paper, in the Print submenu, make one page per camera. See Printing.

Animating cameras

A camera accepts four kinds of animation block, each added from the Animation actions panel with the camera as the only selected shape. See Animating cameras.

• Position Animation: moves the camera across the board, so the view travels while the camera is active. Shapes parented to the camera travel with it.
• Camera Zoom: changes the camera's zoom over time, zooming the view in or out of the area.
• Active Camera: makes this camera the view for a stretch of the animation. Chaining Active Camera blocks of different cameras is how an animation moves from one area of the board to the next.
• Attributes Animation: changes lens and filter controls over time, such as a filter's Mix or a blur's radius. See Animating attributes.

See through active camera

While an animation plays in the editor, the canvas camera follows the camera of the current Active Camera block as long as See through active camera is on in the Timeline panel. When the animation has no Active Camera blocks, playback uses the first camera in the Cameras panel.

Player interaction

Cameras shape how viewers move around the Player. Three settings use them, in the Player Settings section of the Attributes panel, in Player mode. Player settings covers that section in full.

• Start camera: the camera the Player opens on. The default, Zoom fit all, opens on the whole board, or on the only camera when the board has exactly one.

• Bounds camera: keeps the viewer's panning and zooming inside its area. The default, No bounds, leaves the whole board reachable. The animation can still take the canvas camera outside it.

• Camera follow: whether the canvas camera starts following the Active Camera blocks. It's off by default, and shows only when the board has camera animation, including animated lens or filter controls. It's the same setting as See through active camera in the Timeline panel, and viewers can switch it in the Player:

  • On: the view follows the animated camera, and dragging on the board scrubs the animation. Playback covers only the times that Active Camera blocks cover.
  • Off: viewers move freely and see the outline of the current active camera.

  See Camera follow.

Three more things happen without any setting:

• Step through cameras as slides: viewers use ↓ or Page Down and ↑ or Page Up, in the order of the Cameras panel. See Stepping through cameras.
• Cameras stay hidden: they don't show and can't be selected in play mode or in the Player. Shapes attached to them show as usual.
• Use the board's camera settings: the passepartout and the transitions from Camera settings also apply in the Player.

Limits

• A camera can't be rotated.
• A lens holds up to 8 filters.
• Lenses need WebGL2. Without it, the camera shows the board unfiltered.
• A lens file can't be larger than 1 MiB.