PuppetPad

Behind a toy, a powerful animation tool.

You stare at one of your drawings and think "I wish this thing would actually move." PuppetPad makes that happen. Plus a few uses you haven't thought of yet.

Grab an image. A doodle from Procreate, a photo of your dog, your boss mid yawn, a regrettable selfie. The app opens it, builds an invisible mesh around the figure, and hands you pins. Drag a pin and the figure moves with it. Drag again and it becomes animation. That is the entire workflow.

YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE AN ANIMATOR
PuppetPad was made for:

. People who want memes more elaborate than Photoshop copy and paste
. Parents who want their kid's drawing to actually walk
. Graphic designers blocked on what to do with their right hand
. Anyone who wants to animate someone's profile picture without their consent
. Anyone who wants to animate someone's profile picture WITH their consent
. Beginning animators who find Live2D and Spine intimidating (rightfully so)
. Pro animators who just want a quick iPad rough
. You, who opened the App Store out of boredom

HOW IT WORKS
1. Import a PNG. The contour mesh is generated automatically. You won't see it. It just works.
2. Tap anywhere to place a pin. Pins are joints.
3. Drag pins to animate. Every move becomes a keyframe by itself.
4. Hit play.
5. Export as GIF. Send to the family group chat.

THINGS PEOPLE END UP MAKING
. Characters waving arms like they actually exist
. Cat photos performing snake dances
. Company logos pulsing like an anxious heart
. Kid drawings waving goodbye to grandma over FaceTime
. Caricatures of questionable taste
. Story vignettes
. That one meme that needed that one detail to move
. Loading animations for your own app project
. Character rough drafts before doing the polished work elsewhere

WHAT'S INSIDE THE TOY
Underneath the playful surface, PuppetPad runs a real animation engine. Alpha aware mesh generation, an ARAP solver for natural deformation, keyframed timeline, multi pin selection, bone rigs with inverse kinematics, mesh density control, undo and redo via multi finger taps. You don't need to know what any of that means to use the app. But the engineer in you might appreciate that it's there.

FEATURES

. Apple Pencil supported (works with fingers too, if that's how you live)
. iPad landscape, full screen, zero clutter
. Works offline
. No login, no signup, no newsletter
. No ads. E