So I have a lot of animation files, in the form of json, atlas and png, and I want to get the gifs of these animations. They can only be viewed on the skeletonViewer-3.8.99 which doesn't have any export options, like mp4, gif or batch of pngs, so I'm able to view the animations but can't really export it in any way. I know that the actual software has different options to export, but the older versions aren't available to download so I can't use that either. What is the best way for me to obtain the gifs of all these animations?
Export options on spine viewer
To export your animations as GIFs, you can use the Spine software itself, which provides various export options including GIF. However, since you mentioned that you are using an older version of the SkeletonViewer which lacks export options, here are a few alternative approaches:
Command Line Interface (CLI): If you have access to the Spine CLI, you can automate the export process. This can be particularly useful if you have a large number of animations to export. You can find more information on how to use the CLI for exporting here.
Using the Latest Spine Editor: If possible, update to the latest version of the Spine editor. You can then import your JSON, atlas, and PNG files into the editor and use the export options to create GIFs. If you need to update your Spine version, you can download and install the latest version from your license page.
Post-Processing Tools: If you can export your animations as image sequences (PNG), you can use external tools to convert these sequences into GIFs. Tools like Photoshop, GIMP, or online converters can help you create GIFs from a series of images.
Unity Recorder: If you have access to Unity, you can use the Unity Recorder to capture your animations and export them as GIFs. You would need to import your Spine animations into a Unity project and then use the Unity Recorder to capture the animations.
For more detailed steps on exporting GIFs using the Spine editor, you can refer to the Spine User Guide.
Hgguru but the older versions aren't available to download
Spine allows you to run any older version found on the changelog page back to 2.1.27.
You need Spine to do exports. You can import the JSON files into 3.8 and then export them using the UI. I don't remember if 3.8 can take JSON as input on the CLI to do exports.
You can import your JSON into Spine and save a .spine project file, then you can export the project file with any newer version of Spine. The latest version has the most features, currently 4.2. I don't remember if 3.8 has a CLI option to import a JSON file and save a .spine file. If not, you'll have to use the UI to do that step.