Day 38/ 38 – Moho. Done.

Thirty-eight lessons ago, I opened Moho for the first time. I had never used it before, so I started as a complete beginner.

Am I an expert now? No. But I am a solid Moho generalist, and I feel pretty good about that! 🤓

Was it worth it? One hundred percent! Especially considering the entire learning journey was free! I still find it so amazing that we live in a time when you can learn a powerful animation tool from high-quality tutorial online. So huge thanks to YouTube, Moho, and especially Chad Troftgruben for creating such an accessible path to learning.

Things to Know:

✔ Create Layer Comps

Layer Comps

Our last lesson is on layer comps. I have been manually turning layers on and off in Moho to export separate PNG sequences for After Effects. Which to me has not been a big deal, but Moho’s Layer Comps feature automates this entire headache by letting you save custom visibility presets for your characters, backgrounds, and foregrounds.

Instead of multiple renders, Layer Comps allow you to:

• Render everything at once: Moho processes all your separate passes in a single export session.
• Organize folders automatically: Get perfectly sorted folders for your characters, backgrounds, and props.
• Eliminate human error: Helps to stop it from accidentally leave a sketch layer or skeleton visible on a final render.
• Update instantly: If you fix an animation mistake later, you don’t have to re-export every layer manually. Just hit export again, and Moho automatically re-renders and overwrites all your separate PNG folders in one go.

By checking your comps in the Batch Exporter and hitting “Start,” Moho gives you perfectly aligned assets ready to drop straight into After Effects. Here are my three layer comps for the first scene in this weeks project. I didn’t include my text, because I uploaded and animated that in AE.

For this project, I went back to Procreate. My son has been pressing me to revisit this little mouse ever since I took him on a flight in 2024 However, 2025 was a bust, (yes the entire year) boy let me testify, illness can zap you of ALL creative energy. I’m finally feeling better, and it was time to take Mouse out on a little journey… or, in this case, a journey home.

“Don’t worry about unity from piece to piece— what unifies all of your work is the fact that you made it.”

— Austin Kleon

38 days in Moho

I suppose I should have called this 38 Lessons in Moho rather than 38 Days in Moho, because I definitely spent more than 38 days working through them. Either way, I feel like I deserve a little medal or something to commemorate reaching the end of this journey.

I’m so glad my son “encouraged” (harassed, prodded, and genuinely intimidated me) to learn Moho. I was overwhelmed by the idea of learning animation software without any animation background. But it turns out you don’t have to become a full-fledged animator to appreciate what Moho can do. Having the ability to add subtle movement to illustrations and designs is so addicting, incredibly rewarding, and absolutely worth the effort!

Here is a little montage of all 38 lesson headers. I’m not entirely sure why I made it. Maybe it’s to remember the journey. Maybe it’s because I just like the headers. Either way, it feels like a nice way to mark the milestone.

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Day 38 — Afterthoughts

So many thoughts. To begin, one thing that surprised me was how much I enjoyed having a defined box to create within. Each lesson felt like it came with its own brief, and those constraints actually made it easier for me to be creative. It sounds counterintuitive, but having limitations helped me to focus instead of feeling overwhelmed with all the endless possibilities in Moho. And the possibilities are endless!

I’d also love to keep the momentum going with Moho, but I’ve also come away with a very clear realization: being a generalist isn’t where I want to stay. There are some pretty significant gaps in my skills that these 38 lessons didn’t even begin to cover. I have a long list of things I would like to improve on in Moho. Although I’m very glad I took on the challenge, searching for more free training can be a bit overwhelming. It feels like you spend half your time trying to find tutorials and piecing together information instead of actually learning.

Which is why I am now toying with the idea of taking Dani Abram’s Moho Magic courses, rigging and animation, however, that’s a hefty little price tag for my little side hobby. The other want list is McCoy Buck’s, The Animator’s Blue Print: The Beginner’s Guide to Mastering Moho, which comes out July 20th.

For now, I’m enjoying the feeling of having finished one chapter while trying to figure out what the next one should be.

Done.🎉 Nik