Reference
Coming from Harmony
Most of what you use every day in Harmony has a counterpart in Phoenix. This table says where to find it.
| In Harmony | In Phoenix |
|---|---|
| Xsheet view | Window > X-Sheet |
| Pegs | Insert > Peg |
| Parenting in the node hierarchy | Layer parenting: right-click a layer > Parent Layer. Turn off Follow parent's Scale, Skew or Flip in Layer Properties |
| Master controllers | Window > Controllers |
| Curve and envelope deformers | Modify > Deformer |
| Function view | Window > Function Curves |
| Light table | View > Light Table (Shift+L) |
| Multiplane camera, Z depth | Insert > Camera and Window > Layer Depth |
| Line art and color art | Insert > Color Art Layer |
| Palettes and palette styles | Window > Palettes |
| Tone, Highlight and Glow effects | Insert > Effect Layer |
| Render passes | File > Export > Export Movie with Compositing Passes or Multi-layer EXR |
| Lip-sync detection | Modify > Lip Sync |
| Bones and kinematic chains | Bone tool (M), for armatures of symbols and boned shapes |
| Brush presets and textured brushes | Brush Properties and Presets on the Tool tab of the Properties panel |
| Repaint Brush | A brush in Repaint mode |
| Storyboard Pro animatic | File > Import > Import Animatic (EDL or Final Cut XML) |
| Cutters and inverted cutters | Track mattes: right-click a layer > Track Matte (alpha, luma and inverted) |
| Color correction, blur and tone nodes over a scene | Adjustment layers: right-click a layer > Adjustment Layer, effects in Window > Behaviors |
| Particle systems | The Particles behavior, Window > Behaviors |
| Expressions and expression columns | Behaviors, built in or written as short JavaScript files; Link to Controller ties a property to a master controller |
| Scripting (QtScript, Python) | Commands > Script Editor: JSFL and Python |
| Node view (Composite, Cutter, Peg, effect and Display nodes) | Window > Node Graph: Composite and Merge nodes, Matte for cutters, Transform for a peg's move, every effect as a node, and the Output as the display |
| Drawing substitution | Window > Frame Picker, or the drawings in a column of the X-Sheet |
| Onion skin | View > Onion Skin, and Edit > Timeline > Edit Multiple Frames to work on several drawings at once |
| Pencil line thickness, stroke sculpting | The Width tool (U) |
| Free-form deformation over a drawing | The Asset Warp tool (Shift+W): pins on the art, turned, dragged and keyed |
| Morphing with hints | Shape tweens, steered by Modify > Shape > Add Shape Hint |
| Paint with gap closing | The Paint Bucket's gap size on the Tool tab: Close Small, Medium or Large Gaps |
| Time remapping in the Xsheet | The Time Remap behavior, its Frame shown keyed or drawn as a curve in the Motion Editor |
| Motion Blur module | Motion Blur: right-click a layer > Motion Blur, the shutter on the Doc tab |
| 3D rotation, lights and depth of field | The 3D section of the Properties panel, and its Lights and Depth dialog: several lights, shadows and extrusion |
| Safe area and field guide | View > Safe Zones |
| Keyboard shortcut sets | Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts |
| Batch rendering | Window > Render Queue, or Phoenix render |
The node graph
Phoenix's Node Graph composites a timeline's layers much as Harmony's node view composites a scene, with a few differences:
- Layers come first. A timeline stacks its layers as usual until you create a graph for it, and the graph can be turned off again. In a graph, a Layer node takes one layer (or a folder) out of the stack, and Other Layers brings in all the rest, so a layer added later still shows.
- Each timeline has its own. A symbol's graph goes wherever the symbol does, in every instance of it.
- Rigging stays on the timeline. Pegs, parenting and bones are set on layers and in the X-Sheet, not as nodes; the graph is for compositing.
- What you see. Each node shows a picture of its result, and its eye shows that node on the stage, as a Display node would.
Phoenix saves Phoenix documents (.phx), FLA files and XFL folders rather than Harmony scenes. What only Phoenix draws (deformers, effect layers, palettes) is kept in the file for Phoenix, and the rest opens anywhere FLA files do.