Getting Started

When you launch Stykz for the first time, you will be greeted by the Welcome Center:

The Welcome Center is a launch pad for you to open a recent document (1), create a new document (2), examine "Getting Started" materials (3), and look at various tutorials (4).

Open a Recent Document

The top-left corner of the Welcome Center gives you options for opening any of the documents you opened recently:

The last seven documents will be listed here; if there are more than seven, the last slot will change to read More Recent Documents... :

Clicking the button will bring up a dialog box letting you select from a list of all of your recent documents:

NOTE: These same recent documents are available at the bottom of the File menu (Windows), or in the File > Open Recent submenu.

If you'd rather select a document from disk that doesn't appear in the recent documents list, you can click the Open Other... button, which will bring up a standard file selection dialog box.

In all cases, selecting a document to open (recent or otherwise) will close the Welcome Center and open the selected document.

Creating a New Document

The lower-left corner of the Welcome Center gives you options for creating new documents of various types:

Clicking Default Document will close the Welcome Center and create a new Untitled document based on the setting specified in the Preferences dialog (Preferences > General > New Document Settings > Starting Figure).

Clicking Blank Document will close the Welcome Center and create a new Untitled document that is completely blank.

Clicking From a Stykz .styk File... will bring up a file selection dialog that will let you select a saved Stykz figure file (.styk). When you do so, the Welcome Center will close and a new Untitled document will open with the figure you selected already displayed on the Stage.

Clicking From a Pivot .stk File... will bring up a file selection dialog that will let you select a Pivot Stickfigure file (.stk) in either Pivot 2.x or Pivot 3.x formats. After you have selected the .stk file, the Welcome Center will close and a new Untitled document will open and will automatically import/convert the .stk file into a Stykz figure and display it on the Stage.

Getting Started

The top-right corner of the Welcome Center gives you options for looking at references or resources that will help in getting you started in working with Stykz:

For example, clicking Are You a Pivot User? will open a window that will show you how to translate your skills with Pivot into skill with Stykz.

NOTE: This section will change over time as new resources/references are made available.

Tutorials

The bottom-right corner of the Welcome Center gives you options for accessing tutorials or tips related to Stykz or stick figure animating in general:

If a resource comes from YouTube, it will have the YouTube icon next to it (1). If it is a web link, it will have an HTTP icon next to it (2). Regardless of the kind of icon, the name of the tutorial author and the location where the tutorial came from will be displayed.

NOTE: This section will change over time as new tutorials are made available.

Show at Startup

This checkbox, if checked, will cause the Welcome Center to appear every time Stykz starts up. If you don't want this to happen, uncheck this checkbox and then Stykz will perform the startup operation you specify in the Preferences dialog (Preferences > General > Startup Action).