Directional Sprites

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Introduction and Getting Started

Directional Sprites turns a character into animated sprite sheets seen from up to eight directions, the views a top-down, isometric or side-on game needs. Instead of animating each direction separately, Ludo makes a rigged 3D model of your character, draws it in the style you pick, and renders the animation from every direction you ask for. The directions you render together come from that one model, on the same frame, scale and floor, so the sheets line up in your game.

With Directional Sprites, you can:

• Generate images of a character from a text description, from an image of your own, or from both, and turn the one you pick into a rigged 3D model.
• Draw the model in one of 14 styles, from pixel art and anime cel shading to hand-painted, watercolour, comic ink and 3D renders, and fine-tune each style's settings.
• Animate it with a move from the animation preset library, or with an animation the model already has.
• Render one sprite sheet per direction: any of the 8 views around the character, at one of 5 camera heights from eye level to straight down.
• Render still poses as large images, to animate in the Sprite Generator with a prompt.
• Check the look and every view in a free preview before you render.
• Export the sheets as an Animation Pack or an Animation Sequence, as in the Sprite Generator.

Where to find it. Directional Sprites is in beta. Open it from:

• Directional Sprites in the sidebar.
• The Sprite Generator's Generation Mode menu, where it is listed as Directional Sprites.
• Make Sprites on a 3D model in the 3D Generator, which opens Directional Sprites with that model picked.

How it works. The form has three steps, listed on the left. Under each step, a short status says where the current character stands (for example Rigged model or 8 sheets).

1. Character: describe your character or bring your own image, generate images, pick one, and click Generate and Render to make its rigged 3D model.
2. Style: pick how the sprites are drawn and click Use This Style.
3. Sprites: pick the animation and the views, and render the sheets.

How it works, under the steps, plays a short walkthrough of the whole process. It opens by itself on your first visit.

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Step 1: Character

Step 1 makes the 3D model your sprites are rendered from. It is paid once per character: every sheet you render from the model afterwards is charged on its own (see Credits).

1. Describe your character, bring your own image, or both, and click Generate Images:

   • A description only: type it in the text box (for example A knight in green armour, full body, standing).
   • Your own image: pick it in the Reference Image box beside the text box. Ludo redraws it as a 3D render, ready for a 3D model. The text box then reads Changes (optional): leave it empty to keep the character as it is, or describe what to change (for example Add a red cape and a sword).

   The images land in the Characters gallery below the form, and the first one is picked for you. A redraw is a new picture each time, so if you do not like it, click Generate Images again for another try. To use another image, click Make 3D Model on its card. That only picks it: Generate and Render makes the model. To go back to a description only, clear the Reference Image box.

2. (Optional) Edit Image. The picked image has an Edit Image button that opens the Image Editor, so you can adjust the picture before the model is made. The edited image becomes the character.

3. 3D Model. Choose the 3D model generator. They differ in detail, speed and price:

   • Prop (the default): low-cost, good for everyday props and environment pieces.
   • Hero: highly detailed, accurate 3D generation for close-up assets.

4. Rigging. Choose whether the model is rigged, so it can move:

   • Humanoid (the default): rigs the model so it can play the animation presets, which are all humanoid moves. A model that was not recognized as a humanoid when it was rigged cannot play the presets; step 1 then says This model was not recognized as a humanoid.
   • No rigging: no rig, so motion is not supported and the sprites render still poses.

5. Camera Height. How high the camera sits: Horizon, Low, Isometric (the default the first time; after that, your last pick), High or Top, from eye level to straight down. The preview starts from it, and so do the sprites. You can change it later in Sprites.

6. Generate and Render. Click it to make the model. Making the 3D model takes a minute or two. With Humanoid, it comes back rigged and shows here walking (a still pose when it was not recognized as a humanoid); with No rigging, it shows a still pose.

Once the Model Is Ready

Step 1 shows Your character, walking (or Your character, when it cannot walk) with three shortcuts:

• Change Style opens step 2.
• Change Animation and Change View open step 3.

Make Sprites takes you on to step 3 with the style on screen. Start another character clears the picked character and takes you back to step 1 (your description stays in the box).

The rigging options fold away into a Rigging section, whose title says how the model is rigged (Rigged, Rigged, not humanoid or Not rigged). To rig the model again, open it and click Rig it again. Rigging again saves a new copy of the model, so the original stays in the gallery.

Bringing in a Model from the 3D Generator

Click Make Sprites on any 3D model in the 3D Generator: Directional Sprites opens with that model in step 1. If it is not rigged yet, step 1 offers Rig Model to rig it; with No rigging picked under Rigging, you can go on and render it in still poses. Animations you saved on the model in the 3D Generator come with it and can be rendered in step 3, even when the model was not recognized as a humanoid.

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Step 2: Style

Step 2 sets how your sprites are drawn. The 3D model stays the same; only the look on top of it changes. A new model starts with the last style you saved or rendered with (3D render the very first time), already shown in its preview.

1. Style. Open the style picker and choose a style from the thumbnails (hover one to read its description). The picked style's description shows under the picker.
2. Tune its settings. The style's settings sit next to it as rows of choices. Colour settings (such as Outline in the pixel art styles) also take any colour from the colour picker at the end of the row. More settings are under Advanced Style Options. Reset to the style's defaults puts every setting back.
3. Watch the Quick preview. It shows your character in the style, on the default walk when its skeleton allows it, and updates a moment after each change. It is free. It plays only a few frames so it comes back fast; the sprite sheets you render have every frame and play much smoother. The preview's view follows the camera height: the side for Horizon, a front quarter view for Low and Isometric, the front for High and Top. The views to render are picked in Sprites.
4. Use This Style. Click it: the look is saved on the model and step 3 opens. Once a look is saved and you have not changed it, the button reads Continue to Sprites.

Copy style from... gives this character the style, its settings and the camera height of another character on the current page of the Characters gallery, so a whole cast matches. It is available once another character on that page has a saved style.

The Styles

Each style lists its main settings; the rest are under Advanced Style Options.

• Retro pixel art: chunky 8/16-bit sprites with few colours and a bold outline. Resolution, Outline, Palette.
• Pixel art: modern indie pixel art with soft outlines and rich shading. Resolution, Outline, Palette.
• HD pixel art: large, detailed pixel sprites with smooth shading. Resolution, Outline, Palette.
• Anime cel: crisp anime shading with sharp highlights and thin lines. Shadow colour, Outline, Line colour.
• Soft cel: soft anime shading with gentle gradients and light lines. Shadow colour, Outline, Line colour.
• Cartoon: bold cartoon outlines, bright colours and glossy highlights. Shadow colour, Outline, Line colour.
• Flat colour: clean vector shapes in flat colours with a bold outline. Shadow colour, Outline, Inner lines, Line colour.
• Hand-painted: painted brushwork with graphic shadows and bold ink. Ink lines, Brush texture.
• Watercolour: light watercolour washes with soft edges and paper texture. Line, Wetness, Paper grain, Pigment.
• Comic ink: thick black ink with hatched shadows. Line weight, Hatching, Hatch pattern.
• 3D render: realistic pre-rendered 3D lighting. Lighting, Shadows, Highlights.
• Stylised 3D: bright, chunky mobile-game 3D with soft light. Outline, Rim light, Shadows, Highlights.
• Animated film: soft, glowing animated-film 3D with no outline. Shadows, Highlights, Glow.
• Retro 3D: low-resolution PS1-era 3D with dithered colour. Resolution, Lighting, Colour depth, Dither.

In the three pixel art styles, Resolution is the character's height in art pixels; the sprite is scaled up by whole pixels to the frame size.

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Step 3: Sprites

Step 3 picks what to render and renders it. When you click Use This Style, it starts on the view the style was previewed from (unless you had already picked several views). The Quick preview on the right shows every view you pick, from the angle and camera height it will be rendered at.

Animation

• Choose Animated or Still pose.
• An animated character starts on the default walk. Click Change to open the Animation Presets library: browse it by category or search it, and click a preset to use it. Presets are ready-made moves (walks, runs, attacks, dances and more) retargeted onto your model's skeleton. A model that was not recognized as a humanoid when it was rigged cannot play the presets: step 3 says so and offers only the model's own animations, or a still pose.
• If the model has animations of its own (saved on it in the 3D Generator), they are listed under Its own animations.
• Horizontal travel (off by default): on, the character keeps moving across the frame; off keeps it on the spot, the way a game engine expects.
• Vertical travel (on by default): keeps jumps and bobbing; off pins the character to the floor.

Views and Height

• Views. Click the views on the compass to light them up: Front, Front-Right, Right, Back-Right, Back, Back-Left, Left and Front-Left. 4 sides picks the front, back, left and right; All 8 picks every view. Each view you light up renders its own sheet, on the same frame, scale and floor, so the sheets line up.
• Height. The camera height from step 1: Horizon, Low, Isometric, High or Top. Change it here if you need to.
• With several views lit up, the preview shows one tile per view, placed where the view sits on the compass. Click a tile to see it large (All views goes back), click an empty spot to add that view, or the cross on a tile to drop it.

Sheet Settings (Animated Only)

• Sprite Size: the longer side of each frame. Choose 32, 64, 96, 128, 192, 256 or 384 pixels, or Max (the default), the largest the renderer makes: 640 pixels.
• Max Frames: frames per sheet, sampled over the animation: 4, 9, 16, 25, 36 (the default), 49 or 64. A short clip may give fewer.
• Loop: Auto (recommended) follows the animation. Seamless loop samples the animation with no repeated restart frame. Play once does not sample it as a loop.

A still pose has none of these: stills render large, one image per direction, and are saved with your images.

Rendering

• Animated: click the render button. It counts the sheets, one per view (for example Render 8 Sprite Sheets).
• Still pose: click the render button (for example Render 4 Stills) for one large image per view.

Each sheet and each still is charged separately. Hover the button to see the total before you click.

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Viewing and Exporting Your Sprites

While step 3 is open, the gallery below the form shows Sprites of this character: its sprite sheets, with its Stills above them. Sheets that are still rendering show as placeholder cards, one per view.

The sheets are saved to your sprite sheet history like any other, and the stills to your images. Open in Sprite Generator, next to the gallery title, takes you to the Sprite Generator.

Export (available once the character has at least one sprite sheet) offers the Sprite Generator's two exports, for this character's sheets:

• Animation Pack: normalize multiple animations with consistent sizing and ground alignment.
  1. Pick the sheets to include.
  2. Line them up with the Size, Vertical and Horizontal controls under each one.
  3. Choose the format: Spritesheets (a ZIP with one spritesheet per sprite), Spritesheets + JSON (one spritesheet per sprite plus a TexturePacker-format JSON for Phaser, PixiJS or Cocos2d) or Individual Frames, and Smooth Art or Pixel Art scaling (nearest-neighbor, for crisp pixel edges).
  4. Click Export Animation Pack.
• Animation Sequence: chain animations into a single sequence with automatic frame alignment.

Both work as described under Exporting Animation Packs and Animation Sequence in the Sprite Generator help. Stills are images, so they are not part of these exports.

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Animations the Presets Don't Cover

For a move the preset library does not have (a spell, an effect, an emote), start from a still of your character and animate it in the Sprite Generator:

1. In step 3, switch the Animation to Still pose, pick the views, and click the render button (for example Render 4 Stills).
2. In the Stills gallery, click Generate Spritesheet on the still you want. The Sprite Generator opens in Animate mode with that still as the image.
3. Describe the move and generate, as described under Animating a Sprite in the Sprite Generator help.

A still shows the model as it is, in the style and camera height you picked, from the view you rendered it from, so you can render one still per direction and animate each.

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Credits

Directional Sprites charges for the 3D model once per character, then per sheet or still you render:

• 3D model, rigged (Humanoid): 5 credits on Prop, 16 credits on Hero (the model, plus 1 credit for rigging). With No rigging: 4 credits on Prop, 15 on Hero. The rigging credit is only charged when the model comes back rigged.
• Rig Model, or Rig it again: 1 credit.
• Sprite sheets: 1 credit each at the promotional price, one per view. A full set of 8 directions costs 8 credits.
• Stills: 0.5 credits each, one per view.
• Quick previews, in every step: free.
• Generate Images: 0.5 credits per image, from a description, from your own image or from both.

Credits for a render are held for every view when you click the button, and you are only charged for the sheets or stills that come back. Hover any button that charges credits to see what it will cost before you click.

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Tips for Consistent Results

• One character, one model. Every sheet and still of a character is rendered from the same 3D model, and its style is saved on that model. Render all of the character's moves from it rather than making a new model per animation.
• Match a whole cast. Use Copy style from... in step 2 to give each new character the style, settings and camera height of one you already finished.
• Start from a full-body, neutral pose. Describe the whole character standing (for example full body, standing). The model is rigged from its shape, and a neutral pose rigs better: keep the arms clear of the body and the legs apart. See "The Model's Pose Matters" under Rigging in the 3D Generator help.
• Presets are for humanoids. The animation presets are all humanoid moves, so a character has to be recognized as a humanoid to play them. For creatures and objects, render still poses, or animate the model from a prompt in the 3D Generator and render its own animations here.
• Preview before you render. Previews are free. Try styles on the Quick preview, then check every view in step 3 before you click render.
• Export pixel art as pixel art. For the pixel art styles, choose Pixel Art scaling in the Animation Pack export, so the pixel edges stay crisp.

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Troubleshooting

If something in Directional Sprites does not work as expected, these are the most common causes and fixes.

A button or step is greyed out:

• Generate Images: type a description of your character or pick a reference image first.
• Generate and Render: pick an image first. Until there is one, the model options read Generate an image first.
• Style or Sprites in the step list: both need a 3D model. Make one in step 1.
• Copy style from...: no other character on this page of the gallery has a saved style yet.
• Export: the character has no sprite sheets yet. Stills are images and are not exported here.

The character shows a still pose instead of walking, or step 3 has no Animated option:

• The model is not rigged: it was made with No rigging, or brought in from the 3D Generator without a rig. Click Rig Model in step 1 (1 credit).
• The model was not recognized as a humanoid (step 1 says so, and the Rigging section reads Rigged, not humanoid): it cannot play the presets. Render its own animations, made from a prompt in the 3D Generator, or a still pose.

The rig looks wrong (limbs stretch, or the mesh tears when it moves):

• Rig it again: open Rigging and click Rig it again. It saves a new copy, so nothing is lost.
• If the arms touch the body or the legs touch each other, the rig cannot separate them. Generate a new image of the character in a neutral pose, with clear gaps, and make a new model from it.

The preview shows an error:

• A preset does not retarget onto every model's skeleton. Try another animation, or rig the model again: each rigging run produces a different skeleton.
• For any other error, click Try again on it.

The preview looks choppy:

• The Quick preview plays only a few frames so it comes back fast. The sprite sheets you render have every frame and play much smoother.

A sheet has fewer frames than Max Frames:

• Frames are sampled over the animation, and a short clip may give fewer.

The character slides across the frame, or bobs up and down:

• Turn Horizontal travel off to keep it on the spot, and Vertical travel off to pin it to the floor. Both are in step 3, for animated sprites.

If problems persist, please contact Ludo.ai support or ask on our Discord server for assistance.

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Using Directional Sprites from the API and MCP

The same flow is available from the public API and MCP:

1. (Optional) Make the character image with create3DModelImage (0.5 credits): from a prompt, from your own image redrawn as a 3D render, or both (the prompt then says what to change). Call it again for another try, and pass the url it returns as create3DModel's image.
2. Make the model with create3DModel and rig: true. It gets the general rig, which suits any shape; there is no rig type to pick here. Rigging adds the rigModel price, charged only when the model comes back rigged. A model you already have can be rigged with rigModel (its default rig_type is general).
3. (Optional) Pick an animation: a preset_id from listAnimationPresets, or an animation_url made for this model by animate3DModelPreset or animate3DModel (see below). With none, the sprites are a still pose.
4. Pick a style with listDirectionalSpriteStyles (free). Each style has an id to pass as style_id, and its settings and advanced_settings go in style_params. It also lists the camera heights (horizon, low, isometric, high, top) and the eight directions (S, SW, W, NW, N, NE, E, SE).
5. Check the look with previewDirectionalSprites. It is free and synchronous, and returns each direction's frames as images (4 for an animated model, 1 for a still one), kept for 7 days. You run one preview at a time: starting another cancels the older one, which then answers 204.
6. Render with createDirectionalSprites (one sprite sheet per direction, 1 credit each at the promotional price) or createDirectionalStills (one large image per direction, 0.5 credits each). Pass the model's GLB as model and up to 8 directions, rendered together so they line up. Both run as jobs: poll getApiJob for the result.

The animation is at most one of: a preset_id from listAnimationPresets (any rig type can take one, though retargeting does not succeed on every model; when it does not, the call returns an error), an animation_url (the glb_url of an animation from animate3DModel or animate3DModelPreset, made for this model) or a model_animation the GLB itself carries. With none, each sheet is a single frame.

The defaults match the web: the isometric camera, the SW direction, the render_3d style, horizontal travel off, vertical travel on, a 640 px sprite size (32 to 640) and 36 frames (4 to 100). Set gif or individual_frames to also get each sheet as an animated GIF or as separate frames.