Character Objects

Including Characters in Scenes

One of the most interesting features of Web Cartoon Maker is a support for characters. Any now we are not talking about symbols or letters which make up strings. We are talking about real cartoon character which can walk talk and move their parts.

Let's look into this example:

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

}

I am sure you have a lot of questions looking on this simple example. First line of the program above contains a special directive for compiler to include a character file "boy.h". Every character from Web Cartoon Maker's library require s a special file to be included. These include instructions always begin with a special character # . They usually placed at the top of your program and have a file name embedded between symbols < and > . But how do you know what file should be included? Open your browser (preferably Internet Explorer 7.0 or later) and navigate to the following URL to see a list of all available characters: http://www.webcartoonmaker.com/?art=help/lib_characters

You will see an include file name for every character in the library. Just use the file name for an include instruction at the top of you program.

Looking further on the above example you will notice a line Boy Max; . It looks pretty similar to an image or text object declaration, does not it? The only difference is than image and text objects required a text parameter.

This is really an object declaration! This is a declaration of a character object . (more formally, an “instantiation of the class Boy which is a subclass of IhumanCharacterSideView . This will be discussed in more detail later. For now, just practice saying it and sounding impressive). A Boy character object declaration to be more specific. And Max – is an unique name for the object. You can have more than one Boy character object in your scene. You just need to name them differently (!!!). For example you can name a second object Mike.

You can use all the "set", "get" and "change" methods available for image objects with characters. As you can see we already used one of them – SetVisible .

Using a Character's Parts

But you can do more things with characters! All the characters contain parts – arms, legs, head, eyes, mouth and other. And you can move these parts, rotate and scale them! Actually the parts are almost like other objects. You can access a character part using a dot symbol after an object name. Take a look on example below:

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.RightArm.SetAngle ( 45 );

}

Note: Once again, the poor dot gets a workout. In this case, going from right to left, the “dot convention” uses the dot to separates the function from the part and then the part from the name of the character it is a part of. Although not true for any of the current characters in the WCM library, this process could go on indefinitely. It is certainly possible and even useful to have something like Character.RightArm.Hand.MiddleFinger.TopJoint.SetAngle( 45 );

You can probably guess just by looking on the above example that we change an angle of Max's right arm. The name of method we used to change an angle of the part is the same as we used to change an angle of image, text and character objects. But generally speaking, the method names available for parts are different from method names of other objects we know about.

Let's start by learning what kinds of parts are available. Generally speaking, different characters may have different parts. But most of the characters in the library are human-like. And they have the following parts:

• LeftLeg

• RightLeg

• Body

• LeftArm

• RightArm

• Head

• Mouth

• LeftEye

• RightEye

And you can use the following "set", "get" and "change" methods with parts:

• SetVisible – it works the same way as SetVisible for other objects. Parameter true means that a part will be visible. Parameter false means that it is going to be invisible. The only difference is that all parts are visible by default, while other objects are not

• SetShift – it is similar to other objects' SetPos method. It accepts two double parameters – two coordinates. But these coordinates are relative to a part's origin. The default shift coordinates are (0,0) . And if you want, for example, move it to the left by five pixels and up by three, then you should supply (-5,-3) as parameters. Remember, all "set" methods with numerical values actually insert a control point in the cartoon at a current time and the values between these control points change smoothly.

• SetXShift and SetYShift – as with SetPos these functions are very similar to SetShift but accept only one double parameter and change only one coordinate.

• SetAngle – it works absolutely the same way as SetAngle for other kinds of objects

• SetScale – it works absolutely the same way as SetScale for other kinds of objects

• SetXScale and SetYScale – they work absolutely the same way as SetXScale and SetYScale for other kinds of objects

Let's see how you can move a character's parts

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.SetPos ( 0, 290 );

Max.RighArm.ChangeAngle ( 360, 1 ); // rotate it clockwise

Max.RighArm.ChangeAngle ( 0, 1 ); // rotate it counter clockwise

Max.RighArm.ChangeShift ( - 50, -50, 1 ); // move it left and up

Max.RighArm.ChangeShift ( 0, 0, 1 ); // move it back

Max.RighArm.ChangeScale ( 2, 1 ); // increase the size

Max.RighArm.ChangeScale ( 1, 1 ); // decrease it back

}

Changing a Part's Decals

E very part has a picture associated with it. We call these pictures "Decals". Actually some of the parts can have multiple decals and you can choose which one you want to show. Every decal has its own name. The name of default decal is "DEFAULT" . Most of the parts have only one "DEFAULT" decal. But eyes and mouth have more. LeftEye and RightEye also have decals "WINK1" and "WINK2" . "WINK1" usually is a picture of a half closed eye. "WINK2" usually is a picture of a fully closed eye. Part Mouth usually has decals "SPEAK_M" , "SPEAK_E" , "SPEAK_A" , "SPEAK_O" and "SPEAK_W" . These are mouth pictures associated with speech. There are two more "set" and "get" methods you can use with characters. These are:

• SetDecal – accepts a string as a parameter. It changes the decal (or picture) associated with a part

• GetDecal – accepts no parameters and returns a string – name of the decal associated with a part

Take a look into the following example:

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.SetPos ( 0, 290 );

Max.Mouth.SetDecal ( "SPEAK_M" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.Mouth.SetDecal ( "SPEAK_E" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.Mouth.SetDecal ( "SPEAK_A" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.Mouth.SetDecal ( "SPEAK_O" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.Mouth.SetDecal ( "SPEAK_W" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.Mouth.SetDecal ( "DEFAULT" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.LeftEye.SetDecal ( "WINK1" );

Max.RightEye.SetDecal ( "WINK1" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.LeftEye.SetDecal ( "WINK2" );

Max.RightEye.SetDecal ( "WINK2" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.LeftEye.SetDecal ( "WINK1" );

Max.RightEye.SetDecal ( "WINK1" );

Sleep ( 1 );

Max.LeftEye.SetDecal ( "DEFAULT" );

Max.RightEye.SetDecal ( "DEFAULT" );

Sleep ( 1 );

}

Walking, Talking and Winking

As you can see, you can do many things with the characters. But sometimes it may be little difficult. There are several methods available with characters to simplify most common actions – walking, talking and winking

• GoesTo – it is very similar to ChangePos . It also accepts 3 double parameters – a target coordinates and duration. It also changes the time in your cartoon scene. But beside moving a character, it also moves its parts (legs and arms) to simulate a walking pattern. You can try the following example to see the difference:

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.SetPos ( 200, 290 );

Max.ChangePos ( -200, 290 , 2 );

}

void Scene2 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.SetPos ( 200, 290 );

Max.GoesTo ( -200, 290 , 2 );

}

• Says – it is a one of the most interesting methods. It accepts one string parameter and optionally 2 more double parameters. String can specify an URL of WAV file name like " http://www.webcartoonmaker.com/lib/sounds/people/laugh.wav" , or, like with images, fully qualified path to a WAV file on your computer, like "c:\\laugh.wav" (remember about double back slashes). Alternatively, it could be any English text, which will be converted to audio. There are two more double parameters, but these are optional and you can just omit them. First of them is an audio volume factor. When it is equal to 1 (default), the audio is playing with its original volume. If it is less than 1, then audio is playing quieter. If it is more than 1, then audio is playing louder. Another double parameter specifies how fast you want mouth decals to change during a speech. You suppose to indicate a number of decal changes per second. The default value is 6 which looks compilerpretty good in most cases. Please also keep in mind that this method does not change a current scene time. You must use function Sleep with approximate speech duration after using Says . This inconvenience is related to the fact that the compiler knows nothing about your audio files and does not generate speech. Everything is done in the WCM Player. Take a look into the example below:

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.SetPos ( 200, 290 );

Max.Says (
"http://www.webcartoonmaker.com/lib/sounds/wcm/hello.wav" );

Sleep (1 );

Max.Says ( "c:\\hello.wav" ); // local file must exist

Sleep (1 );

Max.Says ( "Hello" ); // use text to speech

Sleep (1 );

Max.Says ( "Hello", 1.2 , 10 ); // same but louder and faster

Sleep (1 );

}

• Winks, WinksLeft and WinksRight – you can use them with no parameters at all or supply one double parameter – winking duration in seconds. Default wink duration is 0.5 seconds. Obviously, these methods make a character to wink with two or just one eye. They also change a current time in scene:

#include <boy.h>

void Scene1 ()

{

Boy Max;

Max.SetVisible ( true );

Max.SetPos ( 200, 290 );

Max.Winks ();

Max.WinksLeft ();

Max.WinksRight ();

Max.Winks ( 0.2 ); // winks faster

}