Some of the Flash interface components will look familiar to you, as they have the same functionality as other Adobe applications. However, Flash requires a certain mindset to work in it properly, especially when animating with vector graphics and coding with actionscript 3.
Stage: The stage is the main workspace of Flash, all your compositional elements movie clips, buttons, graphics, and etc. Content that is within the box in the middle of the stage will be visible when the Flash movie is output. The grey background area outside the box in the middle is 'off-stage'. You can animate content from off-stage onto the main stage area or use a background image that is larger than the main stage to move around as if the camera is panning across a background.
The Stage has several context which are indicated along the top bar of the stage. It can present content that is in a Scene or can present sub-content such as objects from the library. Timeline: The numbers across the bottom correspond to the frames that occur as time progresses through the movie. You can navigate to any frame of your animation to perform editing. Also, Flash has layers just like many other Adobe applications. These appear along the left side of the Timeline.
Properties: The Properties tab changes depending on which tool on the toolbar you have selected or which object you have selected on the stage. Each object or tool has its own properties which can be adjusted in this tab.
When you have the Selection Tool selected and click the background of the stage, the Properties tab shows the Document Properties.
Keep in mind, however, that you can also reorder these scenes to change their flow. The only function of scenes is to help you organize content. A timeline that spans multiple scenes is still considered a single unit: This is especially important to remember if you're working with and updating variables in a timeline for more on this, see Chapter 12, "Understanding ActionScript". Scenes cannot be used inside the timeline of a symbol.
From the Window menu, choose Scene. The Scene panel will appear Figure From the Insert menu, choose Scene. Either of these actions will generate a new scene, with the default name Scene appended by a number.
The authoring environment will also automatically jump to your newly created scene. Click the Delete Scene button on the Scene panel. An alert box will ask you to confirm the deletion. From the scene list in the Scene panel, click and hold the name of the scene you'd like to reposition. Drag the scene to a new position in the list, and release Figure This enables you to use an existing scene as the starting point for a new one.
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If you have elected to receive email newsletters or promotional mailings and special offers but want to unsubscribe, simply email ask peachpit. Choose a scene from the Edit Scene pop-up menu to switch scenes quickly. In the Scene panel, click the Delete Scene button.
A dialog appears, asking you to confirm that you want to delete the selected scene Figure When you delete a scene top , Flash asks you to confirm the deletion bottom. Click OK. Flash deletes the scene, removing it from the Edit Scene pop-up menu in the Edit Bar as well as from the scrolling list in the Scene panel.
If you don't want to see the warning dialog when you delete a scene, -click Mac or Ctrl-click Windows the Delete Scene button in the Scene panel.
Dragging a scene name in the Scene panel changes the order of scenes. In Windows, a horizontal bar previews the new location for the scene; on the Mac, the bar underlines the scene that will follow the scene you're dragging. When the scene is in the correct location, release the mouse button.
In the Scene panel, double-click the name of the scene that you want to rename. The Name field activates for entering text.
The Pitfalls of Using Scenes Scenes in Flash are tools for organizing content during authoring; they don't exist at runtime. When you create a Flash document, each scene is like a self-contained movie, but when you publish the file, Flash links the scenes into one continuous set of frames. Imagine a document with two scenes: scene 1 has frames numbered , and scene two has frames numbered You can drag them anywhere on your monitor, and you can expand and collapse them by clicking the double-triangle button in their top-right corners.
Flash has dozens of windows. As you work on a project, the History panel keeps track of all your commands, operations, and changes. For more details, see Other Flash Panels. The workspace changes back to the original Essentials layout, even though you did your best to mess it up.
As shown in Figure , when you use the Essentials workspace, the Flash window is divvied up into three main work areas: the stage upper left , the timeline lower left , and the panels dock right. Like most computer programs, Flash gives you menus to interact with your documents. In traditional fashion, Windows menus appear at the top of the program window, while Mac menus are always at the very top of the screen.
The commands on these menus list every way you can interact with your Flash file, from creating a new file—as shown on Starting Flash —to editing it, saving it, and controlling how it appears on your screen. Using these menu choices, you can perform basic tasks like opening, saving, and printing your Flash files; cutting and pasting artwork or text; viewing your project in different ways; choosing which toolbars to view; getting help; and more.
If you prefer, you can also drag down to the option you want. Let go of the mouse button to activate the option. Figure shows you what the File menu looks like. Most of the time, you see the same menus at the top of the screen, but occasionally they change.
For example, when you use the Debugger to troubleshoot ActionScript programs, Flash hides some of the menus not related to debugging. For a quick reference to all the menu options, see Appendix B. As the name implies, the stage is usually the center of attention. The stage is also your playback arena; when you run a completed animation—to see if it needs tweaking—the animation appears on the stage.
Figure shows a project with an animation under construction. The stage is where you draw the pictures that will eventually become your animation. The work area light gray gives you a handy place to put graphic elements while you figure out how you want to arrange them on the stage. Here a text box is being dragged from the work area back to center stage. The work area is the technical name for the gray area surrounding the stage, although many Flashionados call it the backstage.
This work area serves as a prep zone where you can place graphic elements before you move them to the stage, and as a temporary holding pen for elements you want to move off the stage briefly as you reposition things. If you decide you need to rearrange these elements, you can temporarily drag one of the circles off the stage. The stage always starts out with a white background, which becomes the background color for your animation.
When you go to the theater, the stage changes over time—actors come and go, songs are sung, scenery changes, and the lights shine and fade. Flash animations or movies are organized into chunks of time called frames.
Each little box in the timeline represents a frame or a point in time. You use the playhead , shown in Figure , to select a specific frame. So when the playhead is positioned at Frame 10, the stage shows what the audience sees at that point in time. The playhead is a red box that appears in the timeline; here the playhead is set to Frame You can drag the playhead to any point in the timeline to select a single frame.
The timeline is laid out from left to right, starting with Frame 1. Simply put, you build Flash animations by choosing a frame with the playhead and then arranging the objects on the stage the way you want them.
Most simple animations play from Frame 1 through to the end of the movie, but Flash gives you ways to start and stop the animation and control how fast it runs—that is, how many frames per second fps are displayed.
Using some ActionScript magic, you can control the order in which the frames are displayed. The first time you run Flash, the timeline appears automatically, but occasionally you want to hide the timeline—perhaps to reduce screen clutter while you concentrate on your artwork. If you followed the little exercise on A Tour of the Flash Workspace , you know you can put panels and toolbars almost anywhere onscreen.
However, if you use the Essentials workspace, you start off with a few frequently used panels and toolbars docked neatly on the right side of the program window. Flash has toolbars, panels, palettes, and windows. Sometimes collapsed panels look like toolbars and open up when clicked—like the frequently used Tools panel.
Panels are great, but they take up precious real estate. As you work, you can hide certain tools to get a better view of your artwork. You can always get them back by choosing their names from the Window menu. Move a panel. Just click and drag the tab or top of the panel to a new location.
Panels can float anywhere on your monitor, or dock on an edge of the Flash program window as in the Essentials workspace. For more details on docking and floating, see the box on Docked vs. Expand or collapse a panel. Click the double-triangle button at the top of a panel to expand or collapse it.
Expanded panels take up more real estate, but they also give you more details and often have word labels for the tools and settings. Show or hide a panel. Use the Window menu to show and hide individual panels. Checkmarks appear next to the panels that are shown. Close a floating panel. On the Mac, click the X in the upper-left corner. Show or hide all panels. The F4 key works like a toggle, hiding or showing all the panels and toolbars.
Use it when you want to quickly reduce screen clutter and focus on your artwork. Separate or combine tabbed panels. Click and drag the name on a tab to separate it from a group of tabbed panels. To add a tab to a group, just drag it into place. Reset the panel workspace. A docked toolbar or panel appears attached to some part of the workspace window, while a floating toolbar or panel is one you can reposition by dragging. Whether you want to display toolbars and panels as docked or floating is a matter of personal choice.
If you constantly need to click something on a toolbar—which means it needs to be in full view at all times—docked works best. You may notice a color change Figure , especially as you begin to move the panel.
The actual visual effect is different on Mac and Windows computers, but the mechanics work the same. Drag the panel away from the edge of the workspace window and release the mouse button. Flash displays the panel where you dropped it. You can reposition it anywhere you like simply by dragging it again. To dock a floating panel, simply reverse the procedure: Drag the floating panel to the edge of the workspace window and let go of the mouse button.
You see a line or a shadow when the panel is ready to dock. When you let go, Flash docks the panel automatically. Bottom: The checkmarks on the menu show when a toolbar is turned on. When you reposition a floating toolbar, Flash remembers where you put it. If, later on, you hide the toolbar—or exit Flash and run it again—your toolbars appear exactly as you left them. Strictly speaking, Flash has only three toolbars: Main, Controller, and Edit.
Everything else is a panel, even if it looks suspiciously like a toolbar. Figure shows all three toolbars. Main Windows only. The Main toolbar gives you one-click basic operations, like opening an existing Flash file, creating a new file, and cutting and pasting sections of your drawing.
With Flash Professional CS6, the Controller is a little obsolete, because now the same buttons appear below the timeline. Edit bar. Using the options here, you can change your view of the stage, zooming in and out, as well as edit scenes named groups of frames and symbols reusable drawings. The Edit bar is a little different from the other toolbars in that it remains fixed to the stage.
The Tools panel is unique. In the Essentials workspace, the Tools panel appears along the right side of the Flash program window. There are no text labels, just a series of icons. However, if you need a hint, just hold your mouse over one of the tools, and a tooltip shows the name of the tool. Most animations start with a single drawing. And to draw something in Flash, you need drawing tools: pens, pencils, brushes, colors, erasers, and so on.
Chapter 2 shows you how to use these tools to create a simple drawing; this section gives you a quick overview of the six sections of the Tools panel, each of which focuses on a slightly different kind of drawing tool or optional feature. At the top of the Tools panel are the tools you need to create and modify a Flash drawing. For example, you might use the Pen tool to start a sketch, the Paint Bucket or Ink Bottle to apply color, and the Eraser to clean up mistakes.
The Tools panel groups tools by different drawing chores. Selection and Transform tools are at the top, followed by Drawing tools. Next are the IK Bones tool and the Color tools. The View tools are for zooming and panning. The Color tools include two swatches, one for strokes and one for fills. If you like, you can drag the docked Tools panel away from the edge of the workspace and turn it into a floating panel.
In either of these situations, you can use the tools Flash displays in the View section of the Tools panel to zoom in, zoom out, and pan around the stage. Each dot is a pixel.
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