Chapter 4

Creating Animations

Chapter 4 Lessons

1. Create motion tween animations2. Create classic tween animations3. Create frame-by-frame animations4. Create shape tween animations5. Create movie clips6. Animate text

Create Animation

• Introduction– Animation is an important part of any application

or website– Animations are made up of still images– Works for many types of websites including

e-commerce, education, and entertainment websites

• Introduction– Persistence of vision is the concept that our eyes

hold an image for one-tenth of a second before processing another image

– One-tenth of a second is the basis for the frame rate in animation

– Frames rates of 10-12 fps generally provide smooth computer-based animation

Create Animation

• Introduction– Flash allows you to create animations that can

move and rotate an object around the Stage– The animation feature also allows you to change

an object’s shape, size, and color, as well as, object zooming and fading in and out

Create Animation

• Introduction– Flash animation provides two animation

methods1. Frame-by-frame animation2. Tweened animation

a. Motionb. Classicc. Shape tweens

Create Animation

Create Motion Tween Animation

• In motion tween animation, you can specify the position of the object in the beginning and ending frames, and Flash fills in the in-between frames, a process known as tweening.

• When you create a motion tween, a tween span appears on the Timeline.

• A blue highlighted area, called a tween or motion span, will appear on the Timeline for the frames of the animation.

• You can increase or decrease the number of frames in the span by:

• dragging the end of the span• moving the span to a different location or• copying the span and applying it to another object

Create Motion Tween Animation

Sample motion tween animation

Outline of the car positionin each of the selectedframes

Tween span

Onion skin feature turned on

Create Motion Tween Animation

• A keyframe indicates a change in a Flash movie, such as the start or ending of an animation.

• Property keyframes are specific to each property such as a position, color, or rotation keyframe.

Create Motion Tween Animation

• Keep in mind:– You can only animate one object on the stage

in each tween span– You can have multiple motion tween

animations playing at the same time if they are on different layers

Create Motion Tween Animation

• Keep in mind:– A motion tween is an object animation

because, while several changes can be made to an object’s properties, only one object is animated for each motion tween

– The types of objects that you can tween include graphics, buttons, movie clip symbols, and text fields

Create Motion Tween Animation

• Keep in mind:– You can remove a motion tween animation by

clicking the tween span on the Timeline and choosing Remove Tween from the Insert menu

Create Motion Tween Animation

Bezier handles used to alter the path

Bezier handles used to reshape the motion path

Create Motion Tween Animation

Positioning the car object

Create Motion Tween Animation

Changing the ease value

Drag the pointer to the right

Create Motion Tween Animation

Using the Free Transform tool to skew the object

Aligning the car to the path

Create Motion Tween Animation

Create Classic Tween Animation

• Classic tweens provide certain capabilities that motion tweens cannot including altering the ease values on objects.

• In classic tween animations, objects move in a straight line from the beginning location to the end location on the stage.

A motion guide can be used to alter the path of a classic tween animation

A motion guide with an object (motorbike) attached

Create Classic Tween Animation

• Each symbol has a transformation point in the form of a circle (O) that you can use to orient the object when it is being animated.

• The transformation point is also the point that snaps to a motion guide.

Create Classic Tween Animation

• You can reposition the transformation point’s position while in the symbol edit mode by dragging it to a different location.

• Objects also have a registration point (+) that can help you determine the X and Y coordinates of an object on the Stage.

Create Classic Tween Animation

Create Frame-by-Frame Animation

• You can create a frame-by-frame animation by specifying the object that is to appear in each frame of a sequence of frames.

• Frame-by-frame animations are useful when you want to change individual parts of an image.

Three images used in an animation

Create Frame-by-Frame Animation

• When creating a frame-by-frame animation, you need to consider the following points:– The number of different images– The number of frames in which each image will

appear– The movie frame rate

Create Frame-by-Frame Animation

• Keyframes signify a change in the object.• You create frame animation by changing the

object, thus each frame in a frame animation may need to be a keyframe.

• The exception to this is when you want an object displayed in several frames before it changes.

Create Frame-by-Frame Animation

This figure shows the first three frames of an animation in which three different objects are placed one on top of the other in succeeding frames

Onion skin feature is turned on so that all of the objects in frames 1-3 are viewable even though the playhead is on frame 1

The 3 objects placed on top of each other on the Stage, each in its own frame on the Timeline

A frame-by-frame animation of three figures appearing to walk in place

Create Frame-by-Frame Animation

Create Shape Tween Animation

• When you use shape tweening you can have an animation change the shape of an object to any form you want.

• You can also include two objects in the animation with two different shapes.

• You can use shape tweening to change the object’s location, size, and color.

• Morphing is when you change a shape into another, sometimes unrelated, object.

• The number of frames included from the beginning to the end of this shape tween animation determines how quickly the morphing effect takes place.

Create Shape Tween Animation

• When working with shape tweening, you need to keep the following points in mind:– You can apply shape tweening only to editable

graphics– You can shape tween more than one object at a

time as long as all objects are on the same layer

Create Shape Tween Animation

• You can use shape tweening to move an object in a straight line.

• You can use the settings in the Properties panel to set options for a shape tween.

• You can use shape hints to control more complex shape changes.

Create Shape Tween Animation

• Adjust the rate of change between frames.

• Choose a blend option.– The Distributive option– The Angular option

The Properties panel options for a shape tween

Create Shape Tween Animation

• The Distributive option creates an animation in which the in-between shapes are smoother and more irregular.

• The Angular option preserves the corners and straight lines and works only with objects that have these features.

Create Shape Tween Animation

• You can use shape hints to control the shape’s transition appearance during animation.

• Shape hints allow you to specify a location on the beginning object that corresponds to a location on the ending object.

Create Shape Tween Animation

Two shape animations (A morphing into B)with and without shape hints

Create Shape Tween Animation

Create Movie Clips

• Movie clip symbols provide a way for you to create more complex types of animations.

• A movie clip is essentially a movie within a movie.

• Each movie clip has a Timeline which is independent of the main Timeline.

• When you insert an instance of the movie clip into a Flash document, the movie clip continues in an endless loop even if the main Timeline stops.

• Movie clips will help you to organize the different reusable pieces of a movie and provide for smaller movie file sizes.

Create Movie Clips

The process of nesting a movie clip within an animation

The movie clip of a wheel that has been animated to rotate shown in the Edit window

Timeline in the Edit window used to create the animations of the rotating wheel

The animation of a car moving with the wheels placed on the car

Main Timeline used to create the animation of the moving car

Create Movie Clips

• You can view an animated movie clip in the Edit window that is displayed when you double-click the movie clip symbol in the Library panel.

• You cannot view the animated clip by playing the movie on the main Timeline.

Create Movie Clips

Three examples of animated text

Text rotates

Text zooms

Text scrolls from off the Stage to the Stage

Animate Text

Animate Text

• You can motion tween text block objects just as you do graphic objects.

• You can resize, rotate, reposition, and change the colors of text blocks.

• Once you create a motion animation using a text block, the text block becomes a symbol.

• You are unable to edit individual characters within a text box.

• You can, however edit the symbol as a whole.

Animate Text