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Introduction to Flash: Basic Rules before beginning

Flash is a vector animation program, which means that objects (shapes, text, etc.) can be enlarged with no pixelation or blurring of the image. This does not mean that photos (also known as bitmaps) brought into Flash are vector-- these objects use a lot of memory in Flash and do not scale without degrading like vector graphics, so use bitmaps sparingly. You can also draw and paint in Flash, but you will soon realize that it is much different working in a vector drawing program than a bitmap program like Photoshop. Refer to drawing basics in the Flash help section for particular questions on using the tools.

The following are some basic rules for working in Flash:

Make everything a "symbol" except for images used for "shape tweening". In order to make anything else move in Flash, it needs to be a symbol and it needs to be on a keyframe. Make an object a symbol by first selecting it and going to insert-->Create Symbol

There are 3 kinds of symbols you can make: a graphic, a movieclip and a button:

Choose graphic only if you do not want to add interactivity or independent movement to this symbol
Choose movie clip is you're unsure!
Choose button if you want to be able to click on this symbol to have something happen.

 

Once you make an object a symbol, you can use it again and again with little memory size. Symbols sit in the library, to use one, drag it onto the stage. This creates an instance of the symbol. You can make changes to this instance that will not affect the library item, such as making it very big, small, transparent, a different color tint, etc.

The timeline represents the symbol instances position through time.

Use keyframes to define any change in the content or image. Flash can calculate the position of all of the frames in between these keyframes and will automate this animation in a process called tweening.

Each object that you are moving should be on it's own layer. Get in the habit of naming your layers.

Layers are like the shelves of glass plates used in the old Multi-plane camera systems created in the fifties. i.e., top layer, top shelf, second layer, lower shelf, etc. Animations and movie clips (MCs) can be placed on these "shelves" to overlap each other.

You can also load other swf files into your movie at different levels. The main timeline is level 0, but you might have another flash movie (not a movie clip but another file) that you want to load into your current movie, you can assign a level number and this movie will appear over top of the main movie timeline.

Movie clips (also known as MC's) are special types of symbols, they let you have a whole other timeline within that symbol. When in doubt, it never hurts to make your symbol a movie clip, movie clips can do things that graphic symbols can't. When we get into advanced interactivity, you can create a flash movie with buttons, that when pressed, trigger a movie clip to play or take you to another part of the timeline. Think of MC's as Flash's way of creating hyperlinks-- they also require a firm grasp of file structure, because like HTML files that reside in a folder structure, MC's are are timelines that reside in other timelines.

Unless you are playing a straightforward animation without any interactivity or buttons, it is typically a good idea to exclude the use of "scenes" and focus on how MCs and "tell target" works. Think of "tell taget" as an action keyframe making a phone call to a MC and having a conversation with it.

Go on to Understanding Frames and Timelines