2 questions, help is appreciated.... 2advanced style lines

[BlazinVES]

I have 2 questions that someone can hopefully help me with to finish up my flash site.

Firstly, the site is pretty big so I would like to add a preloader, I unfortunately dont know how to go about it. I tried following two tutorials and they all resulted in the movie just playing or the bar just being there throughout the animation.

Secondly, is there anyway to make a path/motion guide, and as the line moves through the guide it starts to extend and adapt into it? Hmmm, here is an example :

http://v4.2a-archive.com/flashindex.htm

The intro lines Im guessing use the type of method im trying to explain, or if not, and someone knows another way, that would be great.

Thanks alot.

 

[digitalpencil]

Preloaders are all well and good but remember that a small swf combined with a preloader is always best!
Firstly, the type of preloader you use depends on your flash movie, one is more simple than the other but basically, if you use components in your movie, then have a look at this video tutorial by Lee Brimelow:

http://64.182.62.176/flv/apreloader.flv

if not, this one'll do fine:

http://64.182.62.176/flv/basic_flash_preloader.flv

You'll need an flv player to play these videos, but they should help you out.

As for your second question, I'm afraid I've really no idea what your after.. all those jazzy white lines flying around are a combination of tweens, guides and masks.
You will need to look into each of these areas individually to achieve the same effect.

Hope this helps

 

[BlazinVES]

Thanks, I'll look into that.

Is there a way to make a mask follow a guide?

 

[digitalpencil]

Yeh, you can tween a mask in the same way you can any object