2D sprite transitioning, keeping keeping in-flow with 'idle' animation
Hi Unity peoples! I think I've worked my way into a bit of a corner, but hopefully I am not the first to do so and there is an easy way out.
I have a little game where santa drops presents and I use these sprites for when he is "flying" and it works great (santafinalv).
However! I would like to include some animation where he actually throws the gifts out, like the highly-skilled mockup (santa-throw)
My issue is this: Obviously when I press a button to drop a gift, it interrupts the "flying" animation and jumps into the "throwing" frames, which makes it weird and jerky.
The only way I can think out of this, is if I take the "flying" frames and draw the "throwing" frames starting at each one of the 24 points in the flying frame - so I can transition in/out of them smoothly. This however means I would need to make 24*4=96 frames for a single split second "throw" animation.
Surely there must be a better way??
[1]: /storage/temp/175960-santafinalv.png
[2]: /storage/temp/175961-santa-throw.png