Week 6
February 12, 2008 +work between weeks
Today we worked on our blogs and project proposals. We also recapped on uploading imagery and using it within a movieclip symbol as well as creating a slideshow.
My proposal was finished although now I have had time to look at how I might do somethings specifically in flash I feel it could do with updating a bit (no in the essence of it but perhaps the detail). I had already dug out some photos so I spent time looking through these to see which ones I felt reflected what I was going to say and thought about how I might want them to move – did I want a simple smart slideshow or a more comic entry and exit for them, would I morph them beyond recognition or keep them as straight forward photographic images. I certainly had already decided since writing my proposal that I would allow myself to make this project simply for the course and be therefore able to enjoy it and make it humorous – rather than if I had wanted to use it on my website for work.
I had to source ad lots of photos, a couple of short movie clips from my phone/stills camera, photo CDs, DVDs and the hard drive of my home computer. These had to be uploaded into a folder and saved on my memory stick between classes to bring in for project work. But some of the images which I would really like to use will need to be scanned in. I will bring these in next week to do during the project time in class.
I tried to source some music which I might use and found several tracks on CD. I would also like a ’clunk’ sound effect or perhaps a ’crack’ to use either when the first button comes into play either as it arrives, or in one of the states.
I also used good ‘old fashioned paper and pens’ to draw out some of my ideas.
Imagery and importing recap
-Importing image – file - import – to stage
-Flash recognises naming conventions so will recognise groups individualised by number.
-Can resize and paint things on it (for example) - appears in library (so can use again and not increase file size much)
-Can animate simply with motion tween
-Put bitmap image inside a movie clip – benefits can control the Alpha (opacity)
Short cuts, tips and extras
Click once then click and drag elements that are on own (such as Action Scrip STOP)
For things that are part of a tween click, drag and ctrl
Reminder – Action Script lives on its own layer – keep at the top for ease. NB if you leave a blank line in action script it still recognises that there’s something there so it will show the action symbol on the timeline keyframe
Shortcut – esc S T = action script stop
My trial and error
In thinking about my project I imported an image of my son on a horse and tried to animated it. I moved around the large image, so the edges were not seen on the stage putting the different end points on keyframes, of course, then I shrunk image to fit on stage to give it a ‘zoom in’ feel. I realised it moved too quick, so I used shift F5 to add in frames between the keyframes to slow it down as it was a bit frantic.
While I was working on this my tutor talked about putting bitmap images into a movie clip on main time line. Then putting the whole thing into another movie clip so that you can animate when inside the outer symbol – so you are animating a movie clip rather than the bitmap. This opens up lots of possibilities and when you are done it is the outer move clip that you can drag and drop from the library on to the main stage/timeline.
Problem solving – if you have a symbol on the stage and double click to go inside it you get the stage showing – if you double click on a symbol in the library then the stage fills the screen and you cannot work off the edges of it.
Back to the slideshow
We looked at creating a slideshow by opening a movie clip symbol and importing a series of images. Then we created two buttons for forward and backward and on each we added action scrip. I had a bit of difficulty creating my second button for some reason. Then I realised I had become confused between things living on the same layer in different locations and things living on different key frames (for some reason) known only to myself. Once I had got myself out of that strange mindset it was fine. I am looking forward to using these methods in my project and am already thinking how I can take this forward.
Here’s a recap on how I did the slideshow. Once I had imported a series of images which appeared within the movie clip symbol as a series of keyframes, I created a button and put it into a button symbol (keeping the text for the button on a separate layer). Then I duplicated the button and changed the text (back and forward). Then I added Action Script to the first button – (making sure the button was selected) using the + symbol – global controls – movie clip controls – on – release (option in action panel). Then (press return) and use the + option again global control – timeline control – next frame.
We put a stop on the first frame of the slide show to give us control of the timeline and then created two buttons below the stage where a series of images were living on individual keyframes on the timeline.
After clicking on the first button to identify it as where we wanted our user-based action to live we went into the actions panel, using the plus icon, to select global functions, movie clip control, on - then selected release from a set of options - go to, then pressed return and went to the timeline controls to select ‘next frame’ .
This told the animation that each time the mouse was released after clicking on the button it should take the user to the next frame. On the other button we put our tutors code to go back to the start.
We also looked at creating a labelling layer (like the action script layer, a functional layer rather than one holding imagery or animation). Once you have one of these in place you can place symbols anywhere on the timeline and make a button command or other action take you there. To identify where the symbol is click on the frame directly above where your symbol’s keyframe is and in the properties panel far left there is a space for frame name. Use a name that is all lower case and without spaces. Then when you put action on a button (for example) instead of putting next frame (from the set options) you can type in the name of the frame you wish the animation to jump to NB this must be put in inverted commas (speech marks).
Tip – across the top of the Action Script panel are some other options: the tick test for errors; speech bubble for code hints
We creating a second movie clip with another slideshow in and a ‘cover page’ a movie clip symbol which we could put both slideshow movie clips into, with buttons to run either
I did manage to create the whole slideshow - with options – and put my movie clip inside a movie clip, but I had to re-do the slideshow inside as had not put alpha fade on it.
Here are a few things I would like to do but don’t know if that is possible:
Can you randomise a path? Can you have a movie clip as a button? (Ah reading back on my notes I have the answer to this! And I tried it out in class using the helicopter animation we were given to try out).
Summary of project detail:
Just to remind me what I have to demonstrate within my project I have summarised the key points here:
* Must incorporate five pieces of audio;
* Must say something about who you are:
* Must use variety of imagery - bitmap and vector, but video optional;
* Must use shape and motion tween, and frame-by-frame animation;
* Must be well documented from preparation to review;
* Must be uploaded to a server on a webpage.
Recap of learning objectives (and meeting some of them)
In doing this and in blogs of independent learning and tutorials I need to demonstrate use and understanding of: (from learning objectives) digital cameras and scanning; bitmap and vector-based graphics; output for both screen and print; very basic digital audio editing; use of the internet; interactivity (use of basic Action Script); simple animation; various file formats,
I alreay note that among those are a couple of things we have not covered directly during course time, such as using a digital camera. However I will be able to demonstrate this as several of the images I am using will be from a digital camera source. I have also demonstrated this as part of the whole diploma in my digital grahics module. Also output for screen and print, as we are using Flash the print element of this is not really relevant, again however I have already demonstrated in my digital graphics module my ability to look at print versions. For this for example I would be looking at the different resolutions of images. On the web where images are small and the computer screen can only support a limited quality of picture, images are uploaded at 72dpi for general use such as websites and this would be applicable to flash. But if you wished to create a nice image to print out larger such as A4 or to create a beautiful image for the mantlepiece you would probably opt for a 300dpi image.
When it comes to different files in my blog I have talked about saving graphic images as .png for flash. These are good (like .gif files often used for website applications) as they work well with block colour. For photographs you would use a .jpeg image. This could be cut down in size in Photoshop by using the option ‘save for web’ and checking how low quality it could be saved as before you started losing definition. In Flash, when you play out your .fla file it creates a .swf file – this file type is a flash movie for web and is specially made for that. It is this element that you upload to a webpage (along with external files that flash creates for imported video – but we will be looking at that later).
As for scanning I will refer to this as my project gets fully under way as I have quite a few images only in paper format and they need scanning in.
