Assisted animated production creation and programme generation

The creation of animated productions is a labour intensive process. Whether the end result is a large-budget motion picture, or a small-scale internet production, there is invariably a large amount of time spent in creating the timeline, arranging assets, previewing and editing. This iterative process is necessary in large-scale productions but can become repetitive and frustrating when the end result is a small production that may have similar elements to previous work. We present a workflow system and framework that are able to both greatly facilitate animated programme production and introduce an element of procedural generation. We further present the Programme Editor, an application designed to be a powerful front end for the framework. The principal contribution of this work is the creation of an XML-based scripting engine that can be used to create an animated production. This permits several techniques, tools and workflows to interchange information, allows rapid incorporation of further tools, and furthermore facilitates the complete automatisation of the production process.