Adobe® Flash® CS3 Professional Bible

Chapter 11. Timeline Animation

IN THIS CHAPTER

• Animating frame by frame

• Editing multiple frames and using Onion skinning

• Working with Shape tweens

• Adding Shape Hints

• Applying Motion tweens

• Using Easing to enhance animation

• Optimizing and integrating multiple sequences

• Using Copy Motion and Paste Motion to reuse timeline animation

In this chapter, we discuss the basic methods and tools used to create animations in the Flash authoring environment. Animation is the process of creating the illusion of movement or change over time. Animation can be the movement of an item from one place to another, or it can be a change of color over a period of time. The change can also be a morph, or change, from one shape to another. Any change of either position or appearance that occurs over time is animation. In Flash, changing the contents of successive frames (over a period of time) creates animation. This can include any or all of the changes we have mentioned, in any combination.

Note

Animation is possible without extending Flash content beyond one frame, but this requires you to apply transformations to graphics using ActionScript commands and/or mathematical equations that are executed by code rather than triggered by the Flash timeline. We suggest you use The Flash ActionScript Bible (Wiley, 2006) as a companion to this book when you are ready to go to the next level with your Flash projects.

Basic Methods of Flash Animation

In Flash, there are three basic methods of animation:

• Frame-by-frame animation ...