Importing gif's to Flash

[natedeia]

I seem to be tripping or every time i import things to Flash it never looks the same. How can one import a gif 89a or gif w/transparent background to Flash and not have it have that horrible color square behind it? They do not seem to be transparent by the time i put it in Flash, i have Flash 5.0.
Secondly, what is the best way to create layers in Flash, in this case meaning that all of one web page is one document, and by clicking buttons you navagate through it, not actually going to separate html pages? Makes sense?
Thanks in advance for your input!

 

[TulsaJeff]

transparency is pretty tricky and not something I have mastered yet for import into Flash. I for one do not use import to bring ine xternal images such as gifs and jpgs.

I simply copy them in fireworks and paste them into Flash....just seems to be easier and works great. Once in Flash simply select the image and select Insert/convert to symbol (F8) and save it as a graphic. this puts it in the library and no matter how many times you pull an instance of the graphic out of the library and onto the stage it never raises the file size more than it would if you only used it once.

As far as layers and frames.... I usually set up all my layers right from the start...

Actions
Frame Names
Buttons
Main Content
Movie Clips
GUI
BackGround

just to name a few I commonly use.

to set up the first page(frame) ... put your buttons on the button layer, any special background fetures on the background layer, text on the text layer, and so on. If youi need some interactivity or some action using tweening or motion guides just insert/new symbol to create a new movie clip and insert it into your movie clip layer.

be sure to put stop() actions in your action layer or it will keep trying to loop the timeline once you get more than 1 frame.

to move on to a new page(frame) hit F6 on each layer and do the same thing again. (Note: any content that will not change from page to page (background for example) simply select several frames over in that layer and hit F5. depending on how many pages of content you want.

once your pages(frames) are set up... you can name your frames by selecting the frames in Frame Names layer and then select the frame tab in the instance panel and type the name in the area specified.

to navigate from frame to frame you will need buttons. insert/new symbol/button

right click on the button and select actions... in the left window select Basic Actions and double-click on goto and Play.

select the goto and Play action in the right window and you will see boxes at the bottom of the dialog box that can be filled in.

simply select the drop down arrow in the center (2nd) box and select frame names.

in the bottom (3rd) box ... click the drop down arrow and select the frame name you want to move to....

(Note:you can also select frame number in the 2nd box and then type in an actual frame number to move to in the 3rd box.)

I suggest trying this much and then posting any specific problems you may have so we can be a little more specific with the help.

hope this helps a little. Ya' Gotta Love It!

 

[natedeia]

Thanks Jeff, i have been reading alot of the input from you in the Fireworks forum, great advice. I will have to read this again when i get home, but looks good to me. I was wondering, can roll over effects happen like in FW 4 when you create a roll over and a object appears some where else?
I have been doing it in FW but if i remember correctly, i dont remember any function like it, well as easy as FW.

 

[TulsaJeff]

Roll over effects are quite simple in Flash.... when creating a button...Insert/new symbol/button... you are given a timeline with 4 frames designated as up,over,down, and hit.

pretty straight forward...whatever you put in each of the frames is what is gonna show during that state of the mouse event.

Hit simply defines the area that activates the mouse event and can be virtually anything... a graphic... or a paint blob or a box...etc Ya' Gotta Love It!

 

[natedeia]

only thing that was throwing me off ( i have been using FW & DW a bunch lately and have not given Flash much thought lately) but was, from what i was remembering was that when i would create a button, go into the edit mode, do the roll over thing which i know how to do, then there was that question, "How can i manipulate a button on say the left side of the web page and have something pop up on the other side in another area that is not shown when in the button editing mode." I just could not picture it, it seems to me that i do not know how to do this since the only thing i know of is the editing mode for the buttons. I will have to check it out with the info above.
Oh and i am quiting my old FORUM at another site, i get much better feed back here and more questions so i can do the same.
But

 

[TulsaJeff]

to do those sort of things....create roll over effects that are quite distant from the actual button...there are many ways to handle this so I want go all out into a lot of details... one thing i will say is this...

If you will right click on your button and choose "edit in place" (instead of just "edit&quot it will save you a lot of time and trouble. it will allow you to work with your button states and still see how it will effect the layout as a whole.

Ya' Gotta Love It!

 

[natedeia]

Geeezzz, I don't know how I did not remember that! See what time will do! hope not to bother with this one anymore, that should do the trick for sure!

 

[natedeia]

The answer to the first question:
What i was doing was actually copying an image from Fireworks and pasting into Flash, but prob was that there was a background. You need to past that object to a transparent background then copy again or try to that effect. Then you past into Flash and it has a transparent BG! You can do that with any image including text images.