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: Flash BlogMacromedia Announces New Flash Video Kit
For all you Flash MX 2004 Professional users out there, Macromedia has added a new weapon in the arsenal for web video integration.
Via a Dreamweaver MX 2004 extension, the Flash Video Kit allows the easy addition of streaming / progressive video download
The good news is, for users who purchase and register online before September 30th 2004 will receive the video kit for free, for everyone else, the kit costs $49 and is
The Flash Video Gallery Macromedia produced a few months ago, has received an update, and can be seen here as an insight into what can be accomplished with the use of integrated video techniques
Certainly sounds something to consider, take a further peek inside and see what it has to offer, I’ll certainly be doing that later today!
Remove Your Scaling Woes!
**Updated 09/08/2004**: v1.0.3 now includes middle mouse wheel support for quick granular control
Not one to sit around twiddling my thumbs, here’s another panel hot off the press as requested by a SitePoint reader that remedies the problem of exactly scaling objects to a given percentage.
I know myself, if you have objects that you have to scale, even with the use of the snapping guides it can be a bit of a chore using the transform tool to scale to a given percentage.
Not any more, simply select your object, and scale away to your heart’s content!
Note: This version may experience slight problems with objects that don’t have registration points (shapes). Also, if you are constantly dragging and scaling you may experience a little bit of drift of the object that you are scaling.
Download Dynamic Scaler Panel for Flash MX 2004 >>
ScatterBug Command Panel for Flash MX 2004
Well, I got tired of duplicating MC instances and altering their opacity at the same time a long time ago, so I thought I’d knock up a quickie panel for duplication and opacity control, which takes a single MC and duplicates it according to your selections within the panel.
Note: Please create a new Flash document and paste the MC that you wish to duplicate into the first frame, then execute the command, as there can be a lot of duplicates!
If you find any issues, then feel free to use the panel on the left to send me feedback and I’ll get them fixed
Download ScatterBug Panel for Flash MX 2004 >>
Font Adjuster Panel for Flash MX 2004
Well, this is one that I use in Fireworks all the time, and thought I’d port it over to Flash just due to the sheer time-saving nature of the panel.
Altering the text size of single or multiple selected text areas can be a royal pain either having to go into the Property Inspector and type in the value by hand until you have the required effect, or use the sensitive pop-up slider which when attempting to increment the font size by 1pt at a time can be tedious.
With the Text Adjuster Panel, simply select your text areas on the screen you wish to modify, then select the step size (default is 1) from the ‘Text Adjuster’ Panel, and hit the increase or decrease buttons until you are happy with the font size. The panel is extremely useful when you wish to increment by a set point size several times in a row.
I have more functionality to introduce in the next few days as an incremental release; as always, let me know what you think!
Download Font Adjuster Panel for Flash MX 2004 >>
SitePoint Flash Blog Panel for Flash MX 2004
Note: Extension Updated 04/08/2004 to include a link to a summary of all the blogs
Well, I got in from work tonight, and had a ponder; then rapidly created a new panel for you guys, the SitePoint Flash Blog Panel Reader.
If your RSS reader isn’t open all the time or you don’t have one, then why not have the latest SitePoint Flash Blog information right there inside Flash MX 2004 while you work?
Download SitePoint Flash Blog Panel for Flash MX 2004 >>
Twist and Fade Command for Flash MX 2004
I’ve created another interesting command, this time with a twist (literally). Some of you may be familiar with the Twist and Fade Command that shipped with Fireworks MX and Fireworks MX 2004, and this one does similar things only in Flash MX 2004.
Download Twist and Fade for Flash MX 2004 >>
Download Twist and Fade for Flash MX 2004 Sample FLAs>>
The best way to get something from the command, is to follow these steps
-Create a new Flash document
-Drag onto the stage some MC’s that you wish to apply the effect to
-Select ‘Commands > Twist and Fade (Flash)
-Play with the settings, and click ‘OK’
NOTE: For more interesting effects, try arranging your MC’s in a geometrical pattern!
An interactive tutorial on how the Fireworks MX / MX 2004 command works can be found at Macromedia which may give you some pointers on how to use the command.
I’m working on a SWF Panel over the weekend, to give it a more ‘touchy-feely’ experience, so I’ll keep you posted
Here are a few examples of what was achieved with a 4 instances of a simple circle shape converted to an MC
And Another…
Getting Stranger…
Flash Anthology Excitement
To say I’m excited about the latest book release from Sitepoint is an understatement. “The Flash Anthology: Cool Effects & Practical ActionScript” is the latest offering from Sitepoint for Flash users, and I’m proud to be involved in such a book.
The release of the book occured during my annual leave, so unfortunately I haven’t been able to get to a PC to blog about it, but I will be busy the coming weeks in the Flash Blog as I have some rather interesting commands that you will I’m sure be interested in!
Whilst writing the book, I always tried to maintain a sense of reality and not just produce one-shot effects that were little or no use to anyone.
It was to this end that I created a plethora of effects ranging from navigation, sound to video and form creation with their feet firmly planted in the real world. Practically all the examples in the book have extended modifications for each effect to achieve differing results, as well as suggestions on how you can further modify the projects to suit your needs.
I hope you enjoy reading and implementing the effects in the book as much as I did writing them, …
JSFL Quickies III :Selective Layer Lock
Selective Layer Locker
I often find when working in Flash (as I like to arrange my layers in logical orders) that selecting objects on the stage in a particular layer, and resizing using the subselection tool etc can be somewhat of a pain when you have a lot of objects on the stage.
I used to find myself locking and unlocking layers just so I could get to where I needed to go without accidentally selecting objects from other layers, so here’s a another quickie command from the pot. To use the ‘Selective Layer Locker’ command simply install the MXP below, click on a layer on the timeline that you wish to edit the contents of, and select ‘Commands > Selective Lock’ to lock all the other layers.
JSFL Quickies II
Create Basic Layers Command
Here’s another timesaver, when you’ve just created a new FLA, use this command to quickly create your new layers (Actions, Components etc) rather than manually adding them in every time.
JSFL Quickies
JSFL (Flash JavaScript) is a powerful medium for interacting with the Flash API during authoring in MX 2004, and over the past few months I’ve been examining the API with a view to creating time saving commands. This is kind of an ongoing process, so I thought I’d throw in a couple of quickies that I use all the time.
Library Generator
When I first create a new FLA, rather than go through the chore of creating multiple folders within the Library Panel, I run the ‘Library Generator’ command, to create a simple list of my commonly used folders ready for population with buttons MC’s etc.
Rocket science it isn’t, timesaving it is!
Random Opacity
Have more than a handful of MC’s that you need to change the opacity for quickly, then look no further, with the ‘Random Opacity’ command you can quickly set a random value for the opacity of the MC, plus it gives the instance a name if it lacks one. Again, its crude, but it does the trick!
