PE7_Flash

Onward...

One of the most important things to learn in Flash is....CREATING ANIMATIONS. This is a long process which seems tedious at first, but I'm sure once you use Flash enough it's not so bad. There are numerous types of frames.
Black dots with a gray background indicate Keyframes which specify a frame in which a change in artwork takes place. Regular frames have a gray backgroun with nothing else. They indicate that no change in artwork is occurring from the last keyframe. A white rectangle with a gray background indicated the last regular frame before a change. A Blank keyframe is designated by a white rectangle with a white circle in it, which indicates there is no artwork present in it. A gray background by itself indicates a regular frame. A white background indicates a blank frame and finally a white rectangle with a white background indicates the last blank frame before the change. Whew!!! One of the most important shortcuts is F6. This is how you create a keyframe. To add a regular frame click F5. F7 gives you a blank frame.

To create an animation all you need to do is select the last frame you want the animation on --> select F5 to create a keyframe on that frame, which will designate the end of the animation --> then go back in between the first and last frame and create keyframes. At those frames you will want to move your objects in order to create the animation.

You can use motion tweens which essentially "fill-in" the motion in between two keyframes. Once created you can modify it to your liking. You can edit motion paths in the tweens, rotate the objects. and even do parallax scrolling. This is by far one of the best upgrades in the Flash software from its last version. It appears the previous version was a little slow going.

One of the coolest tools I learned was the bone tool. Sounds creepy, but it's awesome. You can make objects look like they have joints so that when one part of the object connected by the bone tool moves, the other pieces move in a fashion they would if they were connected by bones/joints. You will need to set up the bone structure first before you animate. You will also need to make sure you are working in a movie instance and not with a graphic symbol. Just click and drag after selecting the bone tool to create hinges. Make sure to always start from the point that will be anchored, for instance if you were using the bone tool on someone's arm you would start on their shoulder and work down to the hand. The motion created by the bone tool is caused Inverse Kinematics. Also known as IK animations.

There is so much more to do with Flash that there is just not enough to share with all of you. This may require another post. It was very slow going working along with the tutorial with the sample files and taking notes, but I'm glad I challenged myself with this software and really look forward into diving into another soon.

For some reason, Lynda.com would only let me go to 99% so I couldn't view my certificate. Here's a pic to show how far I progressed.

PE 6_Flash

Wow, 7, wait, wait, about 14 grueling hours later here I stand...or should I say sit. That Flash tutorial was the longest thing I've ever sat through, but I learned a lot. I took a total of 31 pages of notes. Yes I said 31!!! See...

I am thoroughly exhausted. Here is major run through of the things I learned that I thought were really important:

Symbols: Symbols are essentially buttons, movie clips, or graphics you've created. You can then use these symbols with animations in them and do a host of other things. Symbols take up less file space. You can work in something in 3D after converting it to a symbol. To convert something to a symbol you just click the item --> choose modify in the toolbar menu --> then select convert to symbol.

Layers: Layers allow you to separate out different elements that you are working with on the stage. By keeping everything separate you can easily manipulate things without changing others. You can also copy and paste layers. One really good tip I learned is how to lock all layers except the one I am working on. To do that I use OPT + the layer I want to work on. This locks the inverse. Simple. 

Text Layout Framework: Text Layout Framework is something new for Adobe Flash. It only works in Flashplayer 10 or higher and with Actionscript 3.0. It is possible to use the classic text function, but this functionality in this version makes it much easier. I learned what leading, tracking, and kerning are, as well as ant-alias, which allows you to control how smooth the text is. You can create text boxes that are fixed with by dragging the box to the size you want or creating variable width text boxes by clicking create text box and just start typing. You can connect text through multiple fields by clicking the red arrow in the red box and hovering it over the next text field you want to have the text continue into. Very cool. This will be helpful in making newsletters and the like. If you are worried about your text not showing up on someone else's computer because it's not common, you can embed the font, which does slightly increase the file size, but guarantees the viewer will see the final presentation as intended.

Differentiating Symbols from Instance: Symbols are stored in the library and if you edit them you will edit all the instances of the symbols in your project. Instances are "copies" in a sense of your symbol on the actual stage. You can scale instances and rotate them without effecting the symbol stored int the library. You can apply colors and transformations to instances to give a project in which you are using multiple instances of a symbol some variety. You can also swap and nest symbols inside other symbols.

More to come...

PE4_Flash

I've decided to learn Flash for my next Practical Experience assignment. I logged on to Lynda.com to be very overwhelmed by the amount of tutorial time. Due to the length of the tutorial, I'll be covering one section of it this week in two posts and the other in next week's posts.

I myself am not very familiar with Adobe Suite software so this is a bit slow-going for me, but I want to challenge myself so here we go...

The beginning of the tutorial starts you off with the basics: getting to the file types, the workspace, and the tools you are going to be using. Seeing as I am new to this, I learned a lot and took a lot of notes.

Here are some of the things I learned:

File Types: There are essentially two types of files you work with in Adobe Flash. They are FLA files, which are Flash working files and SWF files, which are output files. FLA files consist of ActionScript files, AIR files, and Flash Lite files. Actionscript refers to the programming language. AIR files are associated with desktop publishing, whereas, Flash Lite files are associated with mobile applications.

 

The Workspace: The workspace is comprised of numerous sections. In the center you have the white space known as the stage. To the right you have the properties toolbox which adjusts and changes as you select and work with different tools. At the bottom of the screen you have the time line which shows the progression of your work for animation and the like along with layers. You can expand all the toolbars/boxes as well as rearrange them to make your own customized workspace.

Merge Drawing versus Object Drawing: When working in Flash you will be working primarily with vector graphics, which are graphics created using lines. Bitmap graphics on the other hand are graphics made up of different pixels. Merge Drawing combines shapes when they overlap on the same layer. Object Drawing is a grouped shaped format. You can see the difference below. The object on the left is an Object drawing (using bitmap graphics) and the one on the right is a Merge drawing (using vector graphics). Before drawing in Flash you must designate whether or not the new shape will be Merge or Object. Once created you can always go back and switch between the two, but it is a much more tedious process.

Here are some keyboard shortcuts/tips I learned as well:

V = selection tool

T = text tool

Q = free transform tool

zoom out while in zoom mode  = hold OPT

cmd + + = zoom in

cmd + - = zoom out

If you are using the selection tool--> hold down the spacebar to turn it into the hand tool

More to come...