Short answer: A background is an event in your timeline. Click the pencil on its row, then Change background, and pick an image. The same panel sets the transition. It saves on its own.
Change a background
- Find the background row in the timeline and click its pencil.
- Click Change background.
- Pick an image and confirm.
Add a background
- Click Add event at the end of the timeline, or the + between any two rows to change the background at that spot.
- Open Background.
- Pick Image, then choose your background.
Want a flat color instead? Switch Background type to Solid color.
Fade or dissolve into it
In the same panel, Transition offers Fade, Dissolve, and Slide. Duration sets how long it takes, up to 5 seconds. Fade also has a Fade color, black or white, and Slide has a direction and a motion.
To blend several changes as one, like a new background and a new character together, add a Transition event around them.
Art that doesn't fit the frame
Framing decides what happens when an image's shape doesn't match the stage:
- Stretch to frame stretches the art to fill the frame.
- Fill frame (crop) scales it up and crops what overflows.
- Fit inside (letterbox) shows the whole image with black bars.
Start every new background the same way
If most of your backgrounds use the same transition or framing, set it once on any background and click the star at the right end of Transition or Framing. The star turns yellow, and every background you add to this novel from then on starts with that setting. Click a yellow star to turn it off.
- The two stars are separate: you can star a transition, a framing, or both.
- Backgrounds you already have keep their own settings.
- A background added inside a Transition event takes only the framing, because the Transition event plays the change.
- The stars are saved in this browser for this novel. Another novel, another browser, or another computer starts without them.
Let Aldus show you
Ask Aldus "how do I change the background?" and press Show me on the card. Forge highlights each control in turn on your own scene. You can also just tell Aldus what you want and apply the edit it writes up.