Edit Grease Pencil sketches in another application

After you save a scene with Grease Pencil images, you can edit your sketches in an external application like Autodesk® Sketchbook®.

You can open and edit Grease Pencil image files where they are saved on disk:

To import archived Grease Pencil frames:

1. Open the Grease Pencil tools. (View > Camera Tools > Grease Pencil Tool.)
2. In the Grease Pencil tools, click . A file browser opens.
3. In the Import file browser window, locate the grease frame archive, and click Import.

   The archive file is imported into your scene, with all the frames at their correct times.

Or launch your image editing program directly from within Maya as follows:

1. Ensure that you have saved the scene containing Grease Pencil sketches at least once.
2. Open the Hypershade window (Window > Rendering Editors > Hypershade) and switch to the Textures tab.
3. Select the GreasePencil file that contains the sketch you want to edit.
4. Open the Attribute Editor (Window > Attribute Editor) and click Edit below the Image Name field.

   Maya opens the image editing application you have set to open .png files on your system. See Specify default media players for information on changing which application launches.

5. Edit and save the image in the external application.
   Important: When saving your Grease Pencil sketches in another application, ensure that you maintain the same file name as well as the transparent background so that the images can be reloaded as expected in Maya.
6. Switch back to Maya and click Reload (under the Image Name field) in the Attribute Editor to reload the updated Grease Pencil image.

Related topics

• Draw in the scene view with Grease Pencil
• Save and share Grease Pencil sketches