Archive for November, 2007

Web hosting comparison - 3. In the Frame Label text box, type

Wednesday, November 21st, 2007

3. In the Frame Label text box, type the text for the label or comment and press Enter (Windows) or Return (Mac). To make the text function as a comment, type two slashes (// ) at the beginning of the comment. (If you get long-winded and go to a new line, type the two slashes at the beginning of the new line as well.) Adding frame labels can be a really nice way to lay out the timing of a movie, by typing in what you want to happen where on your Timeline, for a kind of brief verbal storyboard. This can be particularly helpful when you re working with others on a project. Selecting frames Flash offers two styles of making selections on the Timeline: Frame-based selection (the default): In this method, if you click a frame or a keyframe, it s selected. To select a range of frames, you can click and drag over the frames that you want to select, or you can click the first frame, press Shift, and then click the last frame in the range. Span-based selection: In this method, if you click a frame, it selects the entire sequence containing that frame, from one keyframe to the next. Clicking and dragging moves the entire sequence (between the keyframes) along the Timeline in either direction. To select an individual frame, you need to press Ctrl (Windows) or (Mac). You can change the style of selection by choosing Edit.Preferences (Windows) or Flash Basic.Preferences (Mac) or Flash Professional.Preferences (Mac), clicking the General tab in the Preferences window, and then marking or unmarking the Span Based Selection check box in the Timeline Options section. In span-based selection, when you click the first or last keyframe of a tween and drag, you change the length of the tween rather than just select frames. Copying and pasting frames You can copy frames that contain contents you want elsewhere. Then you can paste the frames in another location. To copy and paste frames, follow these steps: 1. Select one or more frames. 2. Choose Edit.Timeline.Copy Frames to copy the frames to the Clipboard. 204 Part IV: Total Flash-o-Rama
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Michigan web site - and c in that order don t

Tuesday, November 20th, 2007

and c in that order don t have them tween to a curve with the shape hints in c, b, a order unless you want some unusual effects. Flash does a better job with shape hints when you arrange them in counterclockwise order, starting from the upper-left corner of your object. Editing Animation Of course, nothing is perfect the first time, and Flash is quite forgiving. You can edit keyframes in assorted ways. You can t edit tweened frames directly you can view them, but you can edit your objects only in the keyframes, not in the in-between frames. You can overcome this restriction and edit your tweened frames by inserting a new keyframe between your beginning and ending keyframe and then editing the new keyframe. You do this by clicking a frame in the Timeline and then choosing Insert.Timeline.Keyframe. Don t choose Insert.Timeline.Blank Keyframe unless you want to nuke your existing tween animation. Of course, you can always edit tweened frames by simply changing the starting or ending keyframe that defines them. When you edit a keyframe of a tweened animation, Flash automatically recalculates the entire tween. The following sections explain some useful techniques for editing and managing your animations. Adding labels and comments Animation can get complicated after a while. You might find it helpful to add comments to the Timeline to explain what each part of the Timeline is doing. Also, when you start adding interactivity to your movies, you can add labels to frames and then refer to them in your ActionScript. (You can find out more about ActionScript in Chapter 10.) To add a label or a comment to a frame, follow these steps: 1. Select a frame. See the next section for information on selecting a frame. 2. Choose Window.Properties.Properties to open the Property inspector if it s not already open. If necessary, click the collapse arrow on the Property inspector s title bar to expand the inspector to its full size. Chapter 9: Getting Animated 203
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To use shape hints, follow these steps: 1. (Web server version)

Tuesday, November 20th, 2007

To use shape hints, follow these steps: 1. If you haven t already done so, create a shape animation by using shape tweening. Refer to the set of steps in the preceding section if you need help with this task. 2. Click the keyframe where you want to add your first shape hint. 3. With the object selected, choose Modify.Shape.Add Shape Hint or press Ctrl+Shift+H (Windows) or +Shift+H (Mac). Your beginning shape hint appears as the letter a in a small, red circle somewhere on the Stage. 4. Click the small, red circle and drag it to the part of your graphic that you want to mark. 5. Click the keyframe at the end of the shape animation. The ending shape hint appears somewhere on the Stage, again as the letter a in a small, red circle. 6. Click the small, red circle and drag it to the point on your shape to which you want your beginning point to move. The ending shape hint turns green. If you go back to the first frame of the animation, the beginning shape hint turns yellow. 7. Press Enter (Windows) or Return (Mac) to play your movie. You can drag shape hints off the Stage to remove them. Or choose Modify. Shape.Remove All Shape Hints to nuke them all but the layer with shape hints must be selected. (Your animation then reverts to its original tween.) Choose View.Show Shape Hints to see all the shape hints in your current layer and keyframe. Choose it again to hide them. (Again, the layer and keyframe with shape hints must be selected.) Adjusting shape hints To tweak your animation, click the keyframe at the start or end of your shape animation and move your shape hint. Then play your animation again to see the new result. The more complicated your shape animation, the more shape hints you need to use. For more complicated shape animations, you can also add more keyframes between your original starting and ending keyframe. This creates intermediate shapes at the new keyframes which you can then tween (using plenty of shape hints, of course). In other words, you can create two or more shape tweens, one immediately following the other. If you aren t getting the results that you want, make sure that you have placed your shape hints logically. If you have a curve with shape hints a, b, 202 Part IV: Total Flash-o-Rama
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Web site development - using shape tweening. Amazingly, Flash handles this process

Monday, November 19th, 2007

using shape tweening. Amazingly, Flash handles this process automatically. To shape tween one circle into a word, start with a circle. When you get to Step 4 of the shape tweening process, delete the circle and create the text wherever you want. Choose any size, color, and font and then break apart the text (choose Modify.Break Apart). This command breaks the text into letters. Then break apart the text again (choose Modify.Break Apart) to break the letters into shapes. Finish the shape tween, and you re done! To create the effect that Jennie created, create a second, similar shape tween on another layer. To view the effect, choose Control.Test Movie. (The Flash movie is courtesy of Jennie Sweo. You can see this movie on the Web at http://sweo.tripod.com.) Getting Flash to take a hint using shape hints Does the transformation of your shape animation look strange? Flash tries to figure out the simplest and most probable way to change one of your shapes into another, but this solution might not turn out the way that you expect or want. Never fear. You can use the Flash shape hints feature to fix this problem. A shape hint is a marker that you attach to a point on a shape at the beginning and end of a shape change. The shape hints signal to Flash exactly how you want this point and the area around it to move from start to end of the shape tweening process. You can use up to 26 shape hints per layer. Shape hints are displayed on the Stage as small, colored circles with a letter (a z) inside. On the starting keyframe, the shape hint is yellow; and on the ending keyframe, it s green. When you first insert a shape hint before you move it onto your shape it s red. Figure 9-9 shows an example of beginning and ending shapes with shape hints. From this book s companion Web site, at www.dummies.com/go/flash8, you can download the Flash movie file shown in Figure 9-9. It s the file 4 to 5 point star with shape hints.fla in the Ch09 folder. Figure 9-9: Shape hints guide Flash as it tweens your shape. Chapter 9: Getting Animated 201
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To create a simple shape tween, (Web server type) follow these

Monday, November 19th, 2007

To create a simple shape tween, follow these steps: 1. Right-click (Windows) or Control+click (Mac) an empty frame where you want the animation to start and then choose Insert.Timeline. Keyframe. 2. Use the drawing tools to create the beginning shape. You can create complex objects by merging objects of the same color or creating cutouts with objects of differing colors. (Refer to Chapter 3 for details.) 3. Create a new keyframe after the first keyframe wherever you want it on the Timeline by using the same technique that you used in Step 1. 4. Create the ending shape. You can erase the old shape and draw a new one; or use the first shape, still on the Stage, and modify it. You can also move the shape and change its color/transparency. You can quickly change the color by using the Color modifiers in the toolbox. Use the Color Mixer panel to change opacity (alpha). Refer to Chapter 3 for more information on colors and transparency. 5. Click anywhere in the tween between the first and last keyframe. The frame just before the last keyframe is a good place to click. 6. Choose Window.Properties.Properties to open the Property inspector if it s not already open. If necessary, click the collapse arrow on the Property inspector s title bar (Windows and Mac) or bottom-right corner (Mac) to expand the inspector to its full size. 7. Select Shape from the Tween drop-down list. 8. Select an Angular Blend or Distributive Blend type. Select the Angular Blend type for blending shapes with sharp corners and straight lines. It preserves corners and straight lines in the inbetween shapes of your animation. If your shapes don t have sharp corners, use the Distributive Blend type (the default) for smoother in-between shapes. Using the Angular Blend on irregular shapes may cause the animation to vanish! 9. You re finished! Click the first frame and press Enter (Windows) or Return (Mac) to play the animation. Look in the Ch09 folder on this book s companion Web site (www.dummies.com/ go/flash8) for a great example of shape tweening. The file is named opening movie.fla. Here, Jennie Sweo takes two circles and changes them into words 200 Part IV: Total Flash-o-Rama
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Best web hosting - You can t shape tween a symbol instance, text

Sunday, November 18th, 2007

You can t shape tween a symbol instance, text (type), or a group unless you break them apart into shapes by selecting them and choosing Modify.Break Apart. And you have to break apart text blocks twice once to break the text block into individual letters and again to break the letters into shapes. You can also try to shape tween a bitmap image after breaking it apart, but the results might be unpredictable. If you break apart a symbol instance, text block, bitmap image, or group by using Modify.Break Apart, you might have a number of shapes to animate. Be sure to put each animated object on a separate layer. You can do this easily by selecting the objects and choosing Modify.Timeline.Distribute to Layers, which we explain in Chapter 6. 1 2 3 4 5 Figure 9-8: You can twist and deform your objects by using shape tweening, and a circle becomes a star! Chapter 9: Getting Animated 199
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Cheap web hosting - an electron revolving along the oval, so you

Sunday, November 18th, 2007

an electron revolving along the oval, so you make the oval s layer a motion guide layer. Here are three ways you can link your motion guide to your object: Add a layer: Create a new layer under the motion guide layer. The new layer appears indented under the motion guide layer, showing that it s linked to the motion guide, as shown in Figure 9-7. Then, any objects that you put on the new layer snap automatically to the motion guide. After putting your objects on the new layer, all you need to do is click the starting keyframe, drag your object to snap to where you want your animation to start on the path, click the ending keyframe, and snap to where you want your animation to end on the path. Drag the layer: If you already have a layer that you want to attach to your path, drag the layer with your graphics so that it s under the motion guide layer. When the new layer appears indented under the motion guide layer, you know that it s linked. Modify Layer Properties: Select your graphics layer and then choose Modify.Timeline.Layer Properties. In the Layer Properties dialog box, select Guided and click OK. This links the graphics layer to the nearest motion guide layer above your graphics layer. Tweening shapes In shape tweening, you change an object s shape at one or more points in the animation, and the computer creates the in-between shapes for you. You can get some great animation effects by using shape tweening. This process is often called morphing. You can see an example in Figure 9-8. When shape tweening, you can combine changes in shape with changes in position as well as changes in size, color, and transparency. As with motion tweening, you should work with one shape per layer to avoid problems. You can shape tween objects that you have created by using the Flash drawing tools. Figure 9-7: A guide layer. 198 Part IV: Total Flash-o-Rama
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10. Draw your (Cool web site) path, making a few curves

Saturday, November 17th, 2007

10. Draw your path, making a few curves or loop-the-loops, if you want. You can use any of the drawing tools: Pen, Pencil, Line, Circle, Rectangle, or Brush. You can also use the Straighten or Smooth modifiers if you re using the Pencil tool. (The path shown in Figure 9-5 was created by using the Pencil tool with the Smooth modifier.) Lock the object s layer while you re drawing the guide path so that you don t move the object by accident. Refer to Chapter 6 for further instructions on hiding and locking layers. 11. Click the first frame of the animation and drag the object by its registration point (shown by a small circle) to the place on your path where you want your animation to start; let the mouse button go when the registration point snaps to the desired place on the path. 12. Click the last keyframe and drag the object by its registration point to the place on the path where you want the animation to end; let go when the registration point snaps to the desired place on the path. 13. Press Enter (Windows) or Return (Mac) to play the animation. You should see a few moments of death-defying skateboarding (or whatever animation you ve created). You can find the completed animation, skateboarder.fla, in the Ch09 folder on this book s companion Web site at www.dummies.com/go/flash8. Getting your tween ready for prime time The steps listed in the preceding section for tweening along a path provide only the basic process. You often need to make several refinements to motion animation along a path. Not satisfied with your motion path? No problem. Here s a really great feature that lets you easily modify your path. Select the motion guide layer. Choose the Selection tool and reshape the line by dragging from any point on the line. (Just be sure not to break the line apart!) Press Enter (Windows) or Return (Mac) again, and the skateboarder follows the revised path. Want to get rid of that unsightly motion guide? That s easy, too. Click the eye column of the motion guide layer to hide it. Press Enter (Windows) or Return (Mac) to play back the animation. (Even if you don t hide the motion guide layer in this way, the motion guide isn t visible when the movie is published.) Symbols, groups, text, and bitmap images have registration points that are usually at the center of the graphic. When you tween along a path, you might want another point to follow the path. In the section on groups in Chapter 4, you find out how to change the registration point to get the results that you want. What if you ve already got a motion guide and you want to link it to an object on a different layer? Perhaps you draw an oval and then decide that you want Chapter 9: Getting Animated 197
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Top ten web hosting - Tweening along a path You can create animation

Friday, November 16th, 2007

Tweening along a path You can create animation that doesn t move in a straight line by motion tweening along a path that you draw. Suppose that you want to get the skateboarder shown in Figure 9-5 to do some tricks. The following steps show you how to do that. If you want to follow along with these steps, you can download the skateboarder image (skateboarder.bmp) from the Ch09 folder on the companion Web site for this book at www.dummies.com/go/flash8. Then choose File. Import.Import To Library and in the File dialog box that appears, navigate to skateboarder.bmp and click Import to Library. (We made him in Poser a cool program for generating 3-D people, in case you re interested. You can find out more about Poser at www.e-frontier.com.) To tween along a path, follow these steps. (The first steps are the same as the ones we provide earlier in this chapter for motion tweens, in the section Moving symbols, groups, and type. ) 1. Create the first keyframe (if necessary). 2. Place your instance, text block, or group on the Stage. If you re using the skateboarder, drag it from the Library to the left side of the Stage. 3. Create the ending keyframe. Don t move the object as you usually would when creating a motion tween. 4. Click anywhere between the two keyframes. 5. Choose Window.Properties.Properties to open the Property inspector if it s not already open. If necessary, click the collapse arrow in the Property inspector s title bar (Windows and Mac) or bottom-right corner (Mac) to expand the inspector to its full size. 6. From the Tween drop-down list, select Motion. You now have a motion tween with no motion. 7. In the Property inspector, select the Snap check box to snap the registration point of the object to the motion path. 8. Select the Orient to Path check box if you want to rotate the object with the angle of the motion path. 9. Right-click (Windows) or Control+click (Mac) the object s layer and choose Add Motion Guide. A new layer appears on the Timeline. It s labeled Guide and has a motion guide icon. (If you want, you can create this layer before you start the process of creating the animation.) 196 Part IV: Total Flash-o-Rama
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times that you want to rotate your graphic. (Jetty web server)

Friday, November 16th, 2007

times that you want to rotate your graphic. These options rotate your object even if you didn t rotate it in Step 5 of the motion tweening procedure. If you did rotate the object, however, Flash adds the two rotations to end up with the rotation angle that you specified. To control the acceleration or deceleration of the movement, use the Easing slider. By default, the slider is in the middle, which creates a constant rate of movement throughout all the frames. Move the slider down to start slowly and get faster at the end. Move the slider up to slow down at the end. You can create a sense of anticipation or excitement by using this technique. To ensure that your graphic symbol animation loops properly, select the Sync check box. If your animation is in a graphic symbol and the number of frames it takes up isn t an even multiple of the frames that the symbol occupies on the main Timeline, Flash synchronizes the two timelines so that the graphic symbol loops properly in the main Timeline. (This is a cool feature.) We cover the Snap and Orient to Path settings later in this chapter, in the section Tweening along a path. For details on the Sound, Effect, and Sync settings on the right side of the Property Inspector, check out Chapter 11. Tweening colors and transparency To change an object s color, click the keyframe on the Timeline where you want to change its color. Then click the object. Choose Window.Properties. Properties to open the Property inspector if it s not already open. Or if necessary, click the collapse arrow on the Property inspector s title bar to expand the inspector to its full size. If your object is an instance, select one of the options (such as Tint or Alpha) from the Color drop-down list and make the desired adjustments. (Chapter 7 explains how to modify instances of symbols and provides much more detail about using the options on the Color dropdown list.) If your object is a shape rather than an instance, you can simply change its color and opacity in the Color Mixer panel. (See Chapter 3 for more on the Color Mixer.) You can mix and match motion animation with scaling, rotation, color, and transparency changes to create exciting effects. If an object spins and gets smaller while it moves, it can seem to be rolling away from the viewer. Animating semitransparent objects in front of each other creates interesting mixtures of color and gives a semblance of texture and depth in the 2-D world of the Web. Decreasing alpha (opacity) during a tween makes the object appear to fade as it becomes more transparent. Try out some possibilities and come up with ideas of your own. Color fades are faster than alpha fades. If you need an object to fade in or out, your movie loads faster if you tween to or from the background color rather than tween to or from transparency. Chapter 9: Getting Animated 195
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