TOON BOOM HARMONY 12.1
Paint Preferences Guide

2Harmony 12.1 Paint 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 guide is covered by a specific limited warranty and exclusions and limit of liability under theapplicable License Agreement as supplemented by the special terms and conditions for Adobe®Flash® FileFormat (SWF). For details, refer to the License Agreement and to those special terms and conditions.
The content of this guide is the property of Toon Boom Animation Inc. and is copyrighted.
Any reproduction in whole or in part is strictly prohibited.
Trademarks
Harmony is a trademark of Toon Boom Animation Inc.
Publication Date
2015-08-07
Copyright © 2015 Toon Boom Animation Inc. All rights reserved.

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Contents

Contents
Toon Boom Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide

1

Contents

4

Chapter 1: Introduction to Preferences

5

Shortcut Preferences

7General Preferences

11

Drawing Mode Preferences

12

OpenGL Preferences154Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide

Chapter 1: Introduction to Preferences
Adjusting preferences to suit your work style allows you to work more efficiently. Harmony has a series ofpreferences you can adjust to customize your personal workflow.

The Preferences dialog box is divided into the following tabs:•Shortcuts•General•Drawing Mode•

OpenGLNOTE: Some preferences require you to exit and restart the application, or close a view and reopen it.

How to access the Preferences dialog box
Do one of the following:‣From the top menu, select Edit > Preferences (Windows/Linux) or Stage Paint > Preferences (MacOS X).

‣Press Ctrl + U (Windows/Linux) or ⌘ + U (Mac OS X).

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Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide

Shortcut Preferences

To speed up your work, all of the keyboard shortcuts can be customized. You can even choose other software
keyboard shortcut sets.
In Toon Boom Harmony, you can choose a set of default keyboard shortcuts you are familiar with. You can choose
between the following:•Adobe Flash•Toon Boom Harmony•Toon Boom Studio

You can also customize most of the shortcuts and use the search feature to find particular shortcuts.
How to switch keyboard shortcut sets
1. Do one of the following:‣Windows: Select Edit > Preferences‣

Mac OS X: Select Stage Paint> Preferences.

‣Press Ctrl + U (Windows/Linux) or ⌘ + U (Mac OS X).

2. In the Preferences dialog box, select the Shortcuts tab.
3. From the Shortcut Set list, select the desired set.

How to search for a keyboard shortcut
1. In the keyboard shortcut search section, select an option:

7‣Name to search for a keyboard shortcut by its name.

‣Shortcut to search for a keyboard shortcut by its actual keys that activate the shortcut.

2. In the Search field, enter the name of a keyboard shortcut or its shortcut keys.
The keyboard shortcut is highlighted in the left pane. Its shortcuts is displayed on the right pane.

3. If desired, set a different keyboard shortcut.
4. Click OK.
How to set a keyboard shortcut
1. Do one of the following:‣

Windows: Select Edit > Preferences‣

Mac OS X: Select Stage Paint> Preferences.

‣Press Ctrl + U (Windows/Linux) or ⌘ + U (Mac OS X).

8Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide

2. In the Preferences dialog box, select the Shortcuts tab.
3. In the left pane, select a category and then select a command to modify.
4. In the right pane, click the keyboard shortcut.

5. Use the keyboard to set a new shortcut.
‣To remove a command's current keyboard shortcut, click Clear.

‣To return a command’s keyboard shortcut to its default, click Default.

6. Click OK.
If a keyboard shortcut is already in use, the Conflict Detected dialog box will appear notifying you of thecommand to which it is already associated. You can continue to associate the shortcut or cancel theoperation and choose another command.

9Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide10Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences GuideGeneral Preferences

To customize your interface, you will use some of the preferences located in the General tab as well as theCamera tab.
Parameter

Description
Save Palette Lists: When set to "Yes", this preference saves all palette lists you
have modified when the Save command is activated. When set to "No", theSave command will not save the palette lists and you will have to use the Savecommand to save them.

Save

Save Palettes: When set to "Yes", this preference saves all palette you havemodified when the Save command is activated. When set to "No", the Savecommand will not save the modified palettes and you will have to use the Savecommand to save them.
Save Drawings: When set to "Yes", this preference saves all drawings you havemodified when the Save command is activated. When set to "No", the Savecommand will not save the modified drawings and you will have to use the Savecommand to save them.

Colours

Current View Border: Sets the colour of the frame around the workspace view
you are currently using, also known as focus. By default, the colour is red. Clickon the red colour swatch to select a new colour in the Colour Picker window.
Edit Colours: Click on the Edit Colours button to open the Colours window.
Edit Palette Mode: Default value for Edit Palette Mode.
Edit Palette List Mode: Default value for Edit Palette List Mode.
Cycle Exposure: Make navigation in the Xsheet View wrap-around from the last
frame or the last column to the first.

Options/Settings

HTML Browser for Unix: This option is used to view the online help on Linuxmachines. Enter the command to launch the browser, including the path ifnecessary.
Levels of Undo: Determines the number of actions retained by the Undo list. By
default, 50 actions are stored in the list. You can alter the number if you want11

to.
Interactive Colour Recovery: If a colour palette for your scene is deleted orcannot be found, you will be asked if you want to recover colours from theprogram’s memory. If this option is unchecked, the program recovers missing
colours without displaying a dialog box for your input.

Colour Management

Colour Recovery: If this option is unchecked, colour recovery will not occur.
Advanced Palette Lists: The Advanced Palette Lists mode is used to createand store palettes in the Scene or Element Palette List.
Replacement Colours: If certain colours are no longer available, they areautomatically replaced with the ones indicated by the Replacement Colour
swatch. The default colour is red, as it acts as a missing colour warning device.

Drawing Mode Preferences

Parameter

Description
Render Style:Onion Skin•

Normal: The onion skinned drawings is displayed in washed outcolours.

12Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide•Enable Shade: The previous onion skinned drawings are displayed inwashed out red shades and the next onion skinned drawings aredisplayed in washed out green shades.

•Outlines Only: The onion skinned drawings are displayed as outlines
only.

Maximum Wash Value (0,0-1,0): The maximum washed-out value for onion
skinned drawings.
Minimum Wash Value (0,0-1,0): The minimum washed-out value for onion
skinned drawings.
Grid On By Default: When opening the Drawing view, the grid displays
automatically.
Default Multiwheel Colour Picker: Displays the Multiwheel Colour Picker
window instead of the regular Colour Picker.
Options

Brush Size Cursor: When this option is enabled, the brush tool displays thebrush size as a circle around the cursor.
Select Tool is Lasso: When this option is enabled, the Select tool behaves asa lasso selector. When this option is disabled, the Select tool behaves as arectangle selector.
Sticky Eye Dropper: Keeps the Colour Picker’s Dropper tool active until it isreleased by clicking the Dropper icon again.
Auto Gap Closing: The values for automatic gap closing while painting
drawings are: 0 = Disabled, 1=Small, 2=Medium, 3=BigSettings

Light Table: Enable Shade: When enabled, the drawings appearing in theLight Table are displayed in washed out colours in the Drawing view. When
this option is disabled, the drawings appearing in the Light Table aredisplayed using normal colours. This option is for the Drawing view only.

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Harmony 12.1 Paint Preferences Guide

OpenGL Preferences

Parameter

Description
Conservative Texture Management: Turns on and off conservative memory
management for bitmap texture files. Performance will improve when this isenabled. If disabled, you will have a better on-screen rendering of bitmap files
at the expense of slower performance.
Smooth Textures: Smooths out the pixels of bitmap images when zooming in;this improves bitmap image quality.

Settings

Alternate Gradient and Cutter: This is an alternative way to disable write in
the OpenGL Backbuffer, required for some video cards (i.e. GeForce FX5200).
Do not enable this option unless you are experiencing problems with gradientsand cutters in OpenGL.
Maximum Texture Size: The size that the bitmap file will be reduced to whenusing the Conservative Texture Management.
Texture Memory: The amount of temporary memory used to store bitmap
texture files.
The Full Scene Antialiasing is generated by your computer’s graphic card. It
provides a smooth line display in OpenGL. This antialiasing will not only
antialias your drawings but all the different views in the interface.
This option lets you see smooth lines as you draw as well as an antialiased
drawing area. You can change the value of the Full Scene Antialiasing using thePreferences dialog box to fit the current level used in the Camera or Drawing
view.

Full Scene Antialiasing
Enable: By default, this option is off. Select to turn on the Full Scene Antialiasing
option. You'll need to restart Toon Boom Harmony.
Number of samples (For Mac OS): Enter the number of samples you want to
be used for the antialiasing process. The number of samples is basicallyequivalent to the amount of time a pixel will be enlarged to calculate theantialiasing. This technique is called supersampling. The higher the number ofsamples, the better the antialiasing quality will be, but the longer it will take to15

calculate. The recommended value is 4.

NOTE: If you are using Windows or Linux, you must enable your graphic card’santialiasing parameter. Refer to user guide of your graphics card. For example,
the parameters for an NVIDIA GeForce card may look like this:16