Fruity Dance

It even works when FL Studio is not in focus. It's dancing as I write this article.

When Fruity Dance is loaded into a channel, FL Chan appears on the screen as an animated character. Users can reposition the character by clicking and dragging with the mouse. The character's dance moves are triggered by notes placed in the Piano roll, enabling the creation of custom dance sequences that align with the music. This feature is particularly effective for live performances when paired with a second monitor or video projector.

Fruity Dance offers several features to customize the character's behavior:

• Appearance Menu: Lists the available dance moves for FL Chan during playback.
• Mirror Horizontally: Flips the character's movements along the vertical axis.
• Sync Changes: Ensures the character completes the current dance move before transitioning to the next.
• Visible: Toggles the character's visibility on the screen.
• Solid: When enabled, the character captures mouse focus; when disabled, mouse clicks can pass through to the underlying interface.
• Keep in Front: Keeps FL Chan displayed above all other windows.
• On Desktop: Allows the character to remain visible on the Windows desktop even when FL Studio is minimized.
• Blend: Applies a blur effect to the animation steps.
• Speed: Adjusts the tempo multiplier for the character's movements.
• Reflect: Modifies the intensity of the character's reflection.
• Folder Icon: Click to load sprite sheets, including those for FL Chan and Countdown.

To develop personalized animations, users need two specific files located in the FL Studio installation directory under FL STUDIO MAIN FOLDER\Plugins\Fruity\Generators\Fruity Dance\Artwork:

1. Sprite Sheet: A PNG image file that must be 8 cells wide, with the option for an unlimited number of rows. Each row corresponds to a different animation sequence, with the final row reserved for the "held by mouse" animation. All cells should be of uniform size, and transparency is essential for proper integration with the FL Studio/Windows background.

2. Text File (.txt): This file must share the same name as the sprite sheet and contains labels for each row in the sprite sheet, with the last row designated as "Held." Users can refer to existing files like Dance.txt and Count.txt for examples.

Users can drag and drop sprite sheets directly onto Fruity Dance, which will automatically search for the corresponding .txt file. The default Dance.png sprite sheet features cells that are 110 pixels wide and 128 pixels high, but users have the flexibility to customize these dimensions. For optimal results, it is recommended to use an image editor that supports layers and transparency, such as the free software GIMP, to create animations.