Rigging in Procreate Dreams would allow animators to control their 2D character models with a dynamic range of movement. While 2D animation used to rely on mostly hand-drawn techniques, technology had since evolved to allow for software-enabled rigging of character models.
Rather than having to draw movements frame-by-frame, pioneering software such as Toon Boom and Adobe Animate have allowed artists to digitally control movement. Procreate Dreams looks to pave a path for itself as ‘pioneering softwares,’ though whether or not the app has rigging might be key for that.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Procreate Dreams will be getting rigging – yet. Here’s how we know that.
While we wait for the app to launch, we’ve been seeing previews online from animators who have had a chance to try the iPad software. The video above shows one such hands-on, though the Procreate Dreams spokesperson seemed to indicate that there was not a feature that would allow you to create skeleton frames for 2D characters. The launch of the app only looks to be accompanied by key-frame and frame-by-frame animation (not that these aren’t extremely exciting features, might I add.) Despite this, there’s still quite a lot of hope that Savage Interactive will implement a rigging feature in the future. If it is added, having the best iPad for Procreate Dreams will let you make use of all of the processing power it offers.
When could Procreate Dreams get rigging as a feature?
Brad Colbow also had a hands-on with the app, and you can see that while there is no ‘rigging’ feature, their video shows that it’s possible to decompose a scene layer by layer, and warp individual parts to exaggerate movement. While it’s far from what animators are typically used to for rigging, there’s likely to be some updates down the line that implement rigging into Procreate Dreams.
The team behind Procreate, Savage Interaction, seem to be incredibly dedicated towards providing creatives with the best tools at their disposal. Alongside offering an extremely affordable and sustainable one-time payment for the app, they’ve also committed to not using artificial intelligence and generative content in their app – taking a stance against generative art such as Photoshop generative fill. With that in mind, it seems incredibly likely that they will listen to what their users want, which will likely be rigging.
The early access period for Procreate Dreams likely won’t reveal that there’s a rigging feature being kept under wraps – that’s wishful thinking. As we wait for the app’s release, you might want to take a look at our guide on how to make Procreate less pixelated. Once you get started using Procreate Dreams, you might also be interested in our best iPad screen protectors for artists, so that 2D animation doesn’t ruin your screen.
