How do I do these???

[idaryl]

Hello All,

I'm good enough at flash to make a nuisance of myself - I can jump forward and back through a couple of pages with static links - but - when it comes to menu systems (I'm really not that good).

However, during my exploratory travels though those site with .fla's (actionscript.net - flashthief - etc, etc) Ive tried to find a fla similar to I fthis ---

http://www.prideapparel.com/4menus.swf

[by the way my client presented me with this, but, could'nt remember where they found it - seems like standard proceedure with clients ;-)

A swf - NO FLA! dang! Is there anyone out there who can make a fla of these four menus - so I can look at how they are created and try to learn how its done!

The standard user menu does not show this sort of stuff and I have a client trhat wants it bad - they hav'nt decided which one they want yet.

• idaryl •

http://www.designedimage.com

•

 

[oldnewbie]

Frame by frame drawn movie clips... Notice the options only appear after the animated background is in place.

 

[idaryl]

OK, but... how to do it?

• idaryl •

http://www.designedimage.com

•

 

[oldnewbie]

You draw a movie clip frame by frame, until you get the results you want. When fully extended, you add the option buttons.

 

[idaryl]

You appear to be under the impression I know what to do - I mentioned in the first message that I dont - and we seem to be going around in this one-liner answer style.

Sorry if I sound perplexed - I am! -If i knew what I was doing then I would see no reason to ask - sounds reasonable to me, so I ask again do you know (I dont mean you have to tell me the theory - but rather the way/how its done?)

• idaryl •

http://www.designedimage.com

•

 

[Adam14]

You just need to make a new movie clip, frame 1, draw your starting box, frame 2, draw the next movement of the box etc. etc. - until you have your 20+ frames of animation. It will be time consuming. As far as the script for the menu, oldnewbie provided a great script for doing something like this...I'm sure he'll help you. If not, I have a copy of it

Adam

 

[Adam14]

Here's an idea:

http://www.geocities.com/yellowraincoatman/menuexample.fla

of course, you'll need to make your links buttons, but this should give you an idea.

Adam

 

[idaryl]

OK Thankyou I "fiddled" with it and this is what I have - so far ---

http://www.prideapparel.com/menuexample.swf

not much by some designers ideals, but for me, a great step forward - thank you

• idaryl •

http://www.designedimage.com

•

 

[Adam14]

The only difference I see, as oldnewbie pointed out, is that your "links" are there the whole way up, and in your examples, they appear after the animation...don't know how particular your clients are....looks good!

Adam

 

[oldnewbie]

How about this one then?

http://blake.prohosting.com/~tektips/flipmenu.htm

 

[idaryl]

Thats very good - is the fla somewhere so I can see how to do that

• idaryl •

http://www.designedimage.com

•

 

[oldnewbie]

You won't get my re-created .fla that easily, just by asking for it... You'll have to do a little more than that!

But I will give you pointers on how I achieved it...

Started by loading your menu movie in a new 1fps movie to be able to capture the different frames used on that menu 4 animation...

Press one of the buttons and have a look...

http://blake.prohosting.com/~tektips/orgflipmenu.swf

Used a capture utility to capture the animation while it was playing on the screen. Exported a serie of .jpegs which I then re-imported in a new Flash document. Traced over every captured frame and re-created a vector version of the animation, frame by frame. Deleted the imported jpegs, and run tested to determine the framerate I should use to obtain a similar result as the orginal animation. Somewhat 30fps or so... Finally added some hitTest code (basically my code used by Adam), but in this case only for the automatic closing of the menu, if the mouse pointer leaves the area of the movie clip. The opening is really done through a click on the main menu 4 button, rather than on a rollOver...