Toon Boom
Harmony22 Essentials

Preferences Guide

TOON BOOM ANIMATION INC.

+1 514 278 8666

4200 St.Laurent Blvd, Suite 1020
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
H2W 2R2

contact@toonboom.com
toonboom.com

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Legal Notices
Toon Boom Animation Inc.
4200 Saint-Laurent, Suite 1020
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
H2W 2R2
Tel: +1 514 278 8666
Fax: +1 514 278 2666
toonboom.com

Disclaimer
The content of this document is the property of Toon Boom Animation Inc. and is copyrighted. Any
reproduction in w hole or in part is strictly prohibited.
The content of this document is covered by a specific limited w arranty and exclusions and limit of liability
under the applicable License Agreement as supplemented by the special terms and conditions for
Adobe® Flash® File Format (SW F). For details, refer to the License Agreement and to those special terms andconditions.

Trademarks
Toon Boom® is a registered trademark. Harmony™ and the Toon Boom logo are trademarks of Toon Boom
Animation Inc. All other trademarks of the property of their respective ow ners.

Publication Date
09-23-2022
Copyright © 2022 Toon Boom Animation Inc., a Corus Entertainment Inc. company. All rights reserved.

1

Table of Contents

Table of Contents
Table of Contents

2

About Harmony Preferences

3

Accessing the Preferences Dialog

4

Switching Between Preference Sets

5

Exporting Preferences

7

Importing Preferences

8

Resetting Preferences

9

Preferences File Location

10

Preferences Dialog Reference

11

General Preferences

12

Camera Preferences

17

Exposure Sheet Preferences

18

Draw ing Preferences

19

OpenGL Preferences

21

Advanced Preferences232Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

About Harmony Preferences
The Preferences dialog box allow s you to adjust preferences to suit your w orkflow and your production's
needs.

3

Accessing the Preferences Dialog

Accessing the Preferences Dialog
You can access the Preferences dialog from the Edit menu on W indow s, or from the Harmony Essentials
menu on macOS.

How to open the Preferences dialog box
1. Do one of the follow ing:ll

W indows:l

In the top menu, select Edit > Preferences.

l

Press Ctrl + U.

macOS:l

In the top menu, select Harmony Essentials > Preferences.

l

Press ⌘ + U.

4

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Switching Between Preference Sets
Harmony comes preloaded w ith five different preference presets (referred to as preference sets), each tailored
for a different kind of task. By default, the Basic preference set is used. You can choose w hich preference set touse in Preferences dialog.
A large part of the default settings in the different preference sets are the same. The follow ing table describes
w hich option is different depending in each preference set, and how :Preference Set
Tab /Location

Preference

GeneralPencil Tool
Properties

Basic

Compositing

CutoutAnimation

Paperless
Animation

Rigging

Focus on
Mouse
Enter

Off

On

On

On

On

Default
Separate
Position for
Pegs

Off

Off

On

Off

On

StopMotion
Keyframes

Off

Off

On

Off

On

Auto Close
Gap

On

On

On

On

Off

NOTES
l

W hen you customize a preference manually, it is not saved to the current preference set. It issaved as an override for all preference sets.

l

Sw itching betw een preference sets only affects preferences that you have not manuallycustomized yourself. This means, for example, that if you manually enable the Focus on MouseEnter preference, this preference w ill no longer be affected w hen you sw itch to a different
preference set.

l

To make all your preferences affected by the preference set you select again, you must reset
your preferences—see Resetting Preferences on page 9.

5

Sw itching Betw een Preference Sets

How to switch between preference presets
1. Do one of the follow ing to open the Preferences dialog:ll

W indows:l

In the top menu, select Edit > Preferences.

l

Press Ctrl + U.

macOS:l

In the top menu, select Harmony Essentials > Preferences.

l

Press ⌘ + U.

2. In the top-left corner of the Preferences dialog, open the Preference Set drop-dow n and select thepreset you w ant to use.

Preferences w ill be updated according to the table above, except for those that you manually set.
3. Click on OK.

6

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Exporting Preferences
You can export your current preferences to an XML file. You can reimport this file later to restore yourpreferences, or share it w ith project collaborators so that you all use the same preferences.

NOTE
W hen you export your preferences, only the preferences for the currently selected preference set
are exported.

How to export your preferences configuration
1. Do one of the follow ing to open the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog:ll

W indows:l

In the top menu, select Edit > Preferences.

l

Press Ctrl + U.

macOS:l

In the top menu, select Harmony Essentials > Preferences.

l

Press ⌘ + U.

2. Near the top of the dialog, right of the Preference Set: drop-dow n, click on the Save... button.
A save dialog appears.
3. Brow se to the location w here you w ant to save your preference file.
4. Type in the desired name for your preference file.
5. Click on Save.
Your current preference settings have been exported as an XML file, in the selected location w ith
the file name you gave it.

7

Importing Preferences

Importing Preferences
You can import a preference file exported from Harmony.

NOTES
l

To export preferences into a file, see Exporting Preferences on page 7.

l

W hen you import a preference file, it w ill override all your preferences for the currently
selected preference set.

How to import a keyboard shortcut configuration file
1. Do one of the follow ing to open the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog:ll

W indows:l

In the top menu, select Edit > Preferences.

l

Press Ctrl + U.

macOS:l

In the top menu, select Harmony Essentials > Preferences.

l

Press ⌘ + U.

2. At the right of the Preference Set: drop-dow n, click on the Load... button.
An open dialog appears.
3. Brow se to the directory w here your preference file is located.
4. Select the preference file you w ant to import.
5. Click on Open.
The settings in the selected preference file are loaded into the Preferences dialog, overw riting yourcurrent preferences.

8

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Resetting Preferences
You can reset the preferences in Harmony to their default settings.

IMPORTANTThis w ill permanently undo all the changes you made to your Harmony preferences.

How to reset your keyboard shortcuts configuration
1. Do one of the follow ing to open the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog:l

W indows: In the top menu, select Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts.

lmacOS: In the top menu, select Harmony Essentials > Keyboard Shortcuts.

2. In the bottom-left corner of the Preferences dialog, click on Restore All Defaults.
A confirmation prompt appears.
3. If you are sure you w ant to restore the default preferences for Harmony, click on Yes.
All the preferences in the Preferences dialog are now set to their default setting.

9Preferences File Location

Preferences File Location
T-HFND-002-002
After the first time you have launched Harmony, your preferences, along w ith numerous other options andsw itches in the user interface, are stored in a hidden directory on your computer.
Depending on your operating system, you can find your preference files in the follow ing location:l

W indows: C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Toon Boom Animation\Toon Boom Harmony
Essentials\full-2000-pref

NOTE
On W indow s, the AppData folder is hidden. To display it in Explorer, in the top menu, open
the View pane and check the Hidden Items checkbox.

lmacOS: /Users/[username]/Library/Preferences/Toon Boom Animation/Toon Boom Harmony
Essentials/full-2000-pref

NOTE
On macOS, the Library folder is hidden. To display it in Finder, hold dow n the Alt key.

10

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Preferences Dialog Reference
The follow ing section contains a an article for each tab in the Preferences dialog. Each article contains a list of
all the preferences in its tab, as w ell as a description of the preference. Refer to this section if you w ant toknow more about w hat a specific preference does or if you w ant to get familiarized w ith all of the preferencesin Harmony.
General Preferences

12

Camera Preferences

17

Exposure Sheet Preferences

18

Draw ing Preferences

19

OpenGL Preferences

21

Advanced Preferences

23

11

Preferences Dialog Reference

General Preferences

To customize your interface, you w ill use some of the preferences located in the General tab as w ell as the
Camera tab.
Parameter

Description

In Harmony Server, you can decide w hich kinds of assets are saved w hen
you use the Save command. This can be useful if you need specific users to
only be able to make changes to certain aspects of the scene they'rew orking on, or if you w ant to prevent yourself from accidentally making
undesired changes to important assets. Unchecking any of the follow ing
options w ill prevent you from saving their corresponding type of assets:l

Save Scene: Save changes to the list of layers, elements, animation,
timing, layout, effects, scene properties, etc.

l

Save Palette Lists: Save changes to the list of palettes associated tothe scene or to individual elements.

l

Save Palettes: Save changes to the colours and textures containedin palettes.

lSave Drawings: Save changes to existing draw ings as w ell as
new ly created draw ings.

Save

12

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

TIP
If you w ant to save changes made to a type of asset that for w hichsaving w as disabled, you can do so by selecting File > Advanced
Save from the top menu. In the Advanced Save dialog, assets forw hich saving is disabled w ill be unchecked, so you must manuallycheck the assets you w ant to save.

IMPORTANTW hen you close a scene, Harmony w ill not ask for confirmation todiscard changes made to assets for w hich saving is disabled.

Auto- Save:lInterval (minutes): This is the frequency at w hich the auto-savetakes place.

l

Inactivity Interval (seconds): W hen Auto- save is about to takeplace, it verifies if you are drawing or doing anything in theapplication. If so, Auto- save waits this number of seconds before
attempting another save.

l

Ask Before Saving: Before performing an auto-save, the system w ill
prompt you w ith a message to confirm if you w ant to save or not.
You can choose to turn off this option.

lEnabled: This enables the Auto-save feature. If you do not w ant thesystem to automatically save your w ork, deselect this option. The
auto-save is off by default.

Automatically Save W orkspace: Changes to your w orkspace, such as howview s and toolbars are laid out, are automatically saved, making sure yourw orkspace remains the same after you close and re-launch Harmony or if
you sw itch betw een different w orkspaces. If this option is disabled, youmust manually save changes to your w orkspace by selecting W indows >W orkspace > Save W orkspace from the top menu.

Support Gestures: Enables manipulating view s such as the Camera andDraw ing view s using the follow ing gestures:
Optionsl

To pan the view , drag your tw o fingers in any direction, keeping both
fingers at the same distance from each other.

13

Preferences Dialog ReferencelTo zoom in, drag your tw o fingers aw ay from each other.

l

To zoom out, drag your tw o fingers closer to each other.

l

To rotate, drag your tw o fingers in a curve so that they revolve in thesame direction.

14

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Invert Scroll Direction: W hen panning a view by dragging it w ith yourfingers in one direction, this makes the view pan in the opposite direction.
Touch Sensitivity: Control touch sensitivity. On macOS, higher numbers
give a slow er response to pans. On W indow s, higher numbers favour
scale/rotates over pans.
Auto Render: Controls w hether the Camera view 's Auto Render option isenabled or disabled w hen launching Harmony. W hen Auto Render isdisabled, if any change is made to the scene w hile the Camera view is in
Render Preview mode, it w ill sw itch to OpenGL Preview mode. W hen
enabled, it w ill merely refresh the render preview .
Focus on Mouse Enter: In Harmony, some keyboard shortcuts, menus or
toolbar buttons are intended for specific view s in your w orkspace. To use
keyboard shortcuts or other functionalities on a specific view , this view mustbe focused on. For example, the Centre on Selection shortcut w ill find theselected element in the Timeline or Camera view , depending on w hich one
is focused on. Harmony draw s a red rectangle around the currently focusedon view .
By default, to set the focus on a view , you must click on its tab or on
anything inside the view itself. The Focus on Mouse Enter preference w ill
make Harmony automatically focus on the view the mouse cursor is over,making it sw itch the focus on a view and use keyboard shortcuts on it.

NOTE
Some items in the top menu also have functionalities that are specificto the focused on view , but moving the mouse cursor to the top menu
might leave the w rong view focused on. To circumvent this problem, it
might be necessary to become familiar w ith keyboard shortcuts,
contextual (right-click) menus and the view menus available via themenubutton at the top-left corner of some view s.

15

Preferences Dialog Reference

IMPORTANT
Because not all tools can be displayed simultaneously in a single
column, some tools w ill be hidden from the Tools toolbar by default.
You can customize w hich tools appear in the Tools toolbar by rightclicking on it and selecting Customize.

Use Dark StyleSheet (Requires Relaunch): Application loads a dark skinfor the User Interface.

Language (Requires Relaunch): The language in w hich to display the userinterface.
Language

By default, this is set to Autodetect, w hich means that Harmony w ill launchin the language of your operating system, if it is one of the supported
languages, and w ill otherw ise launch in English.

Stop- Motion Keyframes: New keyframes are created as stop-motion
keyframes.
Settings

Default Separate Position for Pegs: New pegs are created w ith separate
position functions.
Default Separate Scale for Pegs: New pegs are created w ith separate
scale functions.

Timeline

Add Keyframe at Beginning and End: Add keyframes at beginning andend: Select this option to copy and paste a set of frames that includes aninterpolated sequence betw een tw o keyframes, but only extracts a partial
section. Under normal circumstances, cutting and pasting a function w ithout
either the start or end keyframe w ould render the function null. This option
caps the partial function w ith a new keyframe w hen you perform the paste.
Extend Exposure of Previous Drawing: W hen draw ing on a blank frame, a
new draw ing is created and the timing is extended from the previous
exposed draw ing.

16

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Camera Preferences

Parameter

Description

Settings

Set Keyframe At Frame One W ith First Application of the Transform Tool:
W hen this option is selected, w herever you set a keyframe on a layer, a keyframe
is added on your frame 1. If this options is deselected, a keyframe is only added tothe current frame. If later on, you add a keyframe on your frame 1, it may modify
the first keyframe you added.
Small Bitmap Resolution: The size, in pixels, of the smaller bitmap version ofyour image. W hen you import a bitmap image into a scene, a smaller version of itis created in order to accelerate the compositing and playback processes.

Show Control Points On Selected Layers: By default, w hen you select anelement w ith the Transform tool, the motion path related to the object isdisplayed.
Control Points

Control Point Tension: The default Tension value for new keyframes and control
points.
Control Point Continuity: The default Continuity value for new keyframes andcontrol points.
Control Point Bias: The default Bias value for new keyframes and control points.

Colours

Background Colour: Lets you change the background colour of the Camera viewin OpenGL View mode.

17

Preferences Dialog Reference

Exposure Sheet Preferences

Parameter

Description

These preferences are used to display or hide certain layer types in the Xsheet
view .
Show Drawing Columns: Displays the Draw ing layers in the Xsheet view .
Filtering

Show Sound Columns: Displays the Sound columns in the Xsheet view .
Show 3D Path Columns: Displays the 3D Path columns in the Xsheet view .
Show Function Columns: Displays the Function columns layers in the Xsheet
view .

Default Add Columns: The default position w here the new column w ill be
added.
Options
Default Column W idth: The default w idth value for the new column being
created.

You can set the minimum and maximum zoom levels to view the Xsheet,depending on the number of columns and row s in the project. Once you set alevel, close and reopen the Xsheet so the new values take effect.
Minimum Zoom Level: Lets you set the low est level of zoom. Choose a value
betw een 1 and 6.
Zoom Levels

Maximum Zoom Level: Lets you set the highest level of zoom. Choose a value
betw een 14 and 20.

NOTE
You can set a keyboard shortcut to view the entire Xsheet.

18Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Drawing Preferences

Parameter

Description

Onion Skin Render Style:•

Original Colours: Draw ings displayed in the Onion Skin are renderedusing their real colours.

•

Coloured:Draw ings displayed in the Onion Skin are displayed in solid red
if they are before the current frame, or in solid green if they are after thecurrent frame.

•
Light Table

Coloured Outlines: Draw ings displayed in the Onion Skin are displayed in
red outlines if they are before the current frame and in green outlines ifthey are after the current frame.

Light Table: Enable Shade: W hen enabled, the draw ings appearing on the Light
Table are displayed in w ashed out colours in the Draw ing view . W hen this option
is disabled, the draw ings appearing in the Light Table are displayed using normal
colours. This option is for the Draw ing view only.
Light Table: Shade in Camera View: W hen enabled, the draw ings appearing onother layers are displayed in w ashed-out colours in the Camera view . W hen thisoption is disabled, the draw ings appearing on other layers are displayed using
normal colours. This option is for the Camera view only.

Grid On By Default: W hen opening the Draw ing view , the grid displays
automatically.

Options

Brush Size Cursor: W hen this option is enabled, the brush tool displays the brushsize as a circle around the cursor.
Synchronize Eraser and Brush: W hen enabled, changing any of the Brush tool's
properties simultaneously changes the corresponding property for the Eraser tool
to the same setting, and vice versa. Likew ise, selecting a preset for one tool w ill
apply this preset's properties for the other tool.

19

Preferences Dialog Reference

Auto Gap Closing in Pixel Units: Disabling this option w ill cause your gap to bezoom dependent. Zoom dependent means that the more you zoom in, the smaller
the gap you can close w ith the Close Gap tools. By enabling this option, youchoose to make the gap display available in pixel units, w hich is not zoom
dependent.
Auto Gap Closing on Startup: The values for automatic gap closing w hile
painting draw ings are: 0 = Disabled, 1=Small, 2=Medium, 3=Big.
Pencil Lines Opacity (%): Lets you set the default tranparency of your pencil
lines.

Background Colour: Lets you change the background colour of the Draw ing view .
Colours
Grid Colour: Lets you change the colour of the grid.

Enable Paper Zoom: Enabling this option allow s you to set the 100% Zoom level
onscreen, in order to physically match the measurements of your paper draw ing.

Zoom

Number of Pixels per Inch: Enter the PPI for your monitor. To obtain the PPI of
your screen, divide the height or w idth of your monitor's resolution setting by thecorresponding physical height or w idth of your monitor screen (resolution height
divided by physical height, or resolution w idth divided by physical w idth) in
inches.
Quick Close Up Zoom Factor: Sets the zoom level for the Quick Close up Zoom
keyboard shortcut.
Maximum Zoom Factor: Sets the maximum zoom level for the paper zoom.

20Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

OpenGL Preferences

Parameter

Description

Conservative Texture Management: Turns on and off conservative memory
management for bitmap texture files. Performance w ill improve w hen this isenabled. If disabled, you w ill have a better on-screen rendering of bitmap files atthe expense of slow er performance.
Smooth Textures: Smooths out the pixels of bitmap images w hen zooming in;this improves bitmap image quality.
Settings

Alternate Gradient and Cutter: This is an alternative w ay to disable w rite in the
OpenGL Backbuffer, required for some video cards (i.e. GeForce FX5200). Do notenable this option unless you are experiencing problems w ith gradients andcutters in OpenGL.
Support Triple Buffer: Enable this option for a better compatibility w ith
W indow s Vista if your video card driver does not allow to disable the triple
buffering option. Not enabling this option may result in a dashing line w hen
draw ing a brush stroke.

21Preferences Dialog Reference

Support Desktop Effects: Enable this option for better compatibility w ith
W indow s 7, W indow s Vista and Mac OS X desktop effects. This w ill prevent
graphic compositing problems from happening w hen the full-scene anti-aliasing
option is enabled.
Maximum Texture Size: The size that the bitmap file w ill be reduced to w hen
using the Conservative Texture Management.
Texture Memory: The amount of temporary memory used to store bitmap texture
files.
Vector Drawing Maximum Texture Size: This is the size that the .tvg file w ill be
reduced to for better performance w hen in OpenGL render mode.

The follow ing options allow you to configure the w ay draw ings are preview ed inHarmony.
Enable (Requires Relaunch) : By default, draw ings displayed in Harmony, suchas in the Camera or Draw ing view , have no antialiasing and display hard pixels at
the edge of strokes and lines. If this preference is enabled, antialiasing w ill bedone through the graphic card to enhance the quality of draw ings and make apreview that resemble the final render more closely. This may impact application
performance negatively.
Number of samples: The amount of times the OpenGL preview is scaled up
before processing it for antialiasing. The higher this value is, the better theantialiasing quality w ill be but the heavier it w ill be on the machine's resources.
Full Scene Antialiasing

NOTES
l

It may be necessary to restart the application to see the effects after
changing either of these settings.

lThese settings may be overriden by the 3D antialiasing settings of thedriver for your graphics card. If changing these settings and restarting
the application seems to have no effect, make sure your graphics card
supports antialiasing, that antialiasing is enabled and that it isconfigured to let applications control their antialiasing.

lThese settings only affect the w ay draw ings are preview ed in OpenGL.
They have no effect on the final rendered image, or on the w ay theimage looks w hen setting the Camera view in Render Preview mode.

22

Harmony 22 Essentials Preferences Guide

Advanced Preferences

Parameter

Description

Support CMYK in PDF/Illustrator Import: Lets you import .pdf and .ai files thatw ere created or exported in CMYK mode. The colours of the resulting imported
image may still not look 100% faithful to its CMYK original due to the RGB
conversion. It is recommended that you convert these files to RGB images before
importing them into Toon Boom Harmony Essentials. Disabling this option w illcause all the colours of the imported image to be displayed as red to indicate thatthe file w as not converted to RBG before import.
Advanced Options

PDF/Illustrator Import as Separate Layers: Imports the different
groups/elements of the .pdf or .ai file as separate layers. For Illustrator files, theimport w ill use the top level group as separate layer names. Deselect this option
to import pdf or .ai files as a single layer.
Enable Camera View Performance Report: Displays debugging information in
the Camera view so that you may see the performance of the application as w ellas the rig being rendered.

Tablet Support

Use Qt W intab Tablet Support (Requires Relaunch): If you are using a tablet
other than W acom, deselect this option (and relaunch) if you are having issues
w ith offset or pressure sensitivity.

UnicodeAllow Unicode Names: Lets you use up to 120 ASCII characters for names ofenvironments, jobs and scenes. This means you can use characters for languages,
such as Japanese, Chinese, French, Spanish, and others, characters for names inyour database setup.

23