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After Effects
Sheetah - Spritesheet Tools V3
Sheetah turns After Effects compositions into production-ready spritesheets in one click, blazingly fast. It renders your comp, packs every frame into an optimized atlas, and writes the data file your engine needs to import and interpret your sheet.
NEW: Version 3 is a major upgrade, the extension has been completely rewritten. Smart Packer, Grid mode, 13+ outputs, Live preview, Import, Animation tools, Tinify, Localized UI, custom exporters and more!
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Sheetah turns After Effects compositions into production-ready sprite sheets in one click. It renders your comp, packs every frame into an optimized atlas, and writes the data file your engine reads. Version 3 is a complete rewrite.
From After Effects animation to an optimized, engine-ready sprite sheet.
Two packing modes
Both modes ship in every license. The images below are real exports of the same 24-frame animation, with the frame rectangles from the data file drawn on top.
Classic grid (1600 x 1600 px)
Exact rows and columns you choose, every frame in a same-size cell, with scan direction and axis control. When your runtime expects frame N in cell N, this is your mode.
Smart Packer (1024 x 512 px)
Optimal bin-packing finds the tightest layout automatically, five times smaller here than the grid. Frames are trimmed and fitted like a puzzle, with trimming, extrude, padding, multipack and power-of-two sizes handled for you.
One click, any engine
Packing the sprites is only half the workflow. Sheetah also generates the data required to use the resulting atlas in your engine, framework or application. Built-in exporters include:
- Unreal Engine (Paper2D)
- Unity
- Godot
- Phaser, Spine, Starling, Cocos2d, Pixi
- JSON, XML, CSS, Egret, UIKit
Need something else? Write your own exporter with a simple Mustache template and Sheetah picks it up automatically.
Everything in one panel
Sheetah docks next to your comp, so everything happens where the animation already is: no image sequences to export, no command-line packer, no re-importing.
Pick a comp and press Create Spritesheet. Sheetah renders the frames, packs the atlas and writes the image plus a data file that remembers every frame. Trim, extrude, padding, multipack, power-of-two sizes, scaling and filtering are all there, along with a status line that tells you what the panel is doing.
In detail
Preview before you export
Sheetah V3 includes a dedicated Preview workspace so you can inspect your packed animation directly inside the extension.
- Play and pause the animation
- Scrub through individual frames
- Adjust playback FPS
- Inspect packed frames inside the atlas
- Switch between different preview backgrounds
- Preview animations spanning multiple atlas pages
The preview reads the same metadata that accompanies your exported sprite sheet, so what you see is what ships.
Bring sprite sheets back into After Effects
Sheetah is not only an exporter. Version 3 introduces a complete sprite sheet import workflow that can reconstruct animations as editable After Effects compositions.
Smart Import rebuilds the animation automatically from the sheet and its metadata:
- Restore individual animation frames
- Restore trimmed frame positioning
- Reconstruct multipack animations across multiple textures
- Create a live, editable After Effects composition
Grid Import handles regular grid-based sheets that were never created with Sheetah:
- Select a sprite sheet image
- Define rows and columns
- Set playback FPS and loop duration
- Rebuild the sheet as an After Effects animation
That makes Sheetah useful for editing, refining and touching up existing game assets as well as creating new ones.
Animate sprite frames directly in After Effects
Sheetah's animation tools provide a simple way to work with sprite-frame animation directly on the After Effects timeline. Setup Animation automatically configures Time Remapping and adds an Animation-Frame slider to the layer, so instead of calculating timing by hand you simply keyframe the sprite frame number you want to display.
- Automatic Time Remapping setup
- Keyframe sprite frame numbers with a slider
- Work with familiar After Effects keyframes
- Export animation data directly from the timeline
Keyframes as code
Your After Effects animation does not have to stay inside After Effects. Sheetah can read your keyed sprite frames and export the resulting animation sequence as data or source code for your project: C#, GDScript, C++, CSV or JSON.
Need another format? Animation exporters use the same customizable Mustache template system as the sprite sheet exporters.
Multiple image formats
Choose the format that fits your production pipeline: PNG, JPG, TGA, TIFF or a layered PSD.
Built-in Tinify compression
Sheetah integrates with Tinify (TinyPNG / TinyJPG) so compatible exported sprite sheets can be compressed directly as part of the export process. Enter your Tinify API key and optionally compress your final PNG or JPG output, without adding another manual optimization step to your pipeline.
Installation
The easiest way to install and license Sheetah is with the aescripts + aeplugins manager app. To install a trial, select Add Trial from the Account menu. Alternatively you can use the ZXP/UXP Installer.
Once installed, open Window > Extensions > Sheetah in After Effects. On first launch, enter your license or start the free trial from the dialog that appears; your license is managed through your aescripts account.
Requires After Effects 2022 or newer. Windows and macOS.
Upgrade Notice
Sheetah V3 is a major new paid upgrade. Existing customers can get an upgrade discount based on how much you paid. If you purchased the previous "Name Your Own Price" version after March 7, 2026, you will get a discount equal to 100% of what you paid. For example, if you paid $10 you would get a $10 discount towards the new version. If you purchased it before March 7,2026, you get a discount equal to 50% of what you paid so if you paid $10, you would get a $5 discount.
To upgrade, simply log in with the same account you used for your original purchase and the discounted amount will be automatically displayed. No discount codes required. If you need any assistance please open a support ticket and we will be happy to assist you.
Anyone who bought Sheetah up until the V3 release date receives V3 as a free upgrade.
Full Sheetah V3 tutorial
The complete workflow from start to finish: installation and licensing, your first Grid export, the Smart Packer, output formats, engine exporters, custom exporters, live preview, importing sprite sheets and exporting animation keyframes as code. Use the chapter markers to jump to the part you need.
Discussions
Want to talk about it?
Head over to r/aescripts to chat with fellow users about this product.
Need Support?
Please open a support ticket to be connected directly with the author of this product
Version History
3.0.4 -
Sep 7, 2026
This release marks a complete rewrite of the extension, rebuilding Sheetah from the ground up to be faster, more stable, and feature-rich. We've introduced powerful new workflows for packing, importing, and previewing sprites, while refining our animation tools.
New Features:
- **Smart Packer (New):**
- **Optimal Packing Algorithms:** Choose from multiple packing strategies (OptimalPacker, MaxRectsBin, MaxRectsPacker) to minimize wasted space.
- **Multipack Support:** Automatically generates multiple atlas textures when sprites don't fit in a single file.
- **Advanced Constraints:** Options for Power of Two (POT) dimensions, fixed sizes, or fully automatic sizing.
- **External Compression:** Integrated Tinify (TinyPNG/TinyJPG) support to compress your output spritesheets directly.
- **Custom Data Exporters:** Create your own metadata formats using Mustache templates (JSON, XML, Lua, etc.).
- **Import Tab (New):**
- **Round-Trip Workflow:** Re-import generated spritesheets back into After Effects to reconstruct animations.
- **Smart Import:** Drag and drop a JSON/XML file to automatically load the texture, detecting FPS, loop duration, and frame data.
- **Grid Import:** Manually configure rows, columns, and playback speed for legacy or grid-based spritesheets.
- **Multipack Reconstruction:** Automatically handles and links multiple texture attributes from a single metadata import.
- **Preview Tab (New):**
- **Live Playback:** Inspect your generated spritesheets with full playback controls (Play, Pause, Scrub).
- **Interactive View:** Zoom and pan around large atlases to inspect pixel-perfect details.
- **Multipack Visualization:** Seamlessly switches between different atlas pages during playback.
- **Background Options:** Toggle between Transparent, Black, White, or Custom checkers to verify transparency.
Refined Features:
- **Animation Tab (Refined):**
- **Streamlined Workflow:** Improved "Setup Animation" tool that automatically adds Time Remapping and Frame Sliders for keyframing.
- **Multi-Layer Export:** Now supports exporting keyframes from multiple layers simultaneously into a single data file.
- **Custom Exporters:** Define your own animation data structures using the new Mustache template system.
Additional Improvements:
- **Grid Mode (Enhanced):**
- Added explicit controls for **Horizontal Direction** (LTR/RTL) and **Vertical Direction** (TTB/BTT).
- Configurable Scan Axis (Row-major vs Column-major).
- **Localization:**
- Auto-detects After Effects host language.
- Fully customizable UI strings via user-accessible JSON locale files.
- **Modern UI:**
- A responsive, high-DPI interface that adapts to your workspace.
2.4.3 -
Aug 29, 2022
2.4.2 -
Aug 11, 2015
2.4 -
Jun 26, 2015
2.3 -
Jan 13, 2015
2.2 -
Sep 5, 2014
- added export option for power of 2 textures
- added option for manual distribution patterns (columns and rows)
- changed spritesheet file name syntax to present more valuable information
- improved custom animation pipeline (including better .json export)
- added support for multiple animations in one composition
1.3 -
Mar 3, 2014
- added notifications if max. comp size is exceeded
- added JSON lib for upcoming big changes
Compatibility
After Effects
2027, 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022
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