Ray of Light Revisited
upuaut8 aka David H
Opening up our Movie Clip and Setting up the Layers for this
Project
| 4a) |
Double click on your
text. It should open up the edit in place
feature, allowing you to edit your movie clip on stage.
You will know that you are inside the movie clip by
looking at the tabs in the upper left corner of your
timeline. One tab is always open there for each project,
it will either say Scene 1, or what ever name you've
given the scene. To it's right, another tab should be
open. It should say lostSoulROL, as that is the name of
our movie clip. If don't see this second tab, you
haven't double clicked in the correct place in the word.
Try again. |
[ These are
the Frame tabs. They will continue to stack one after
another depending upon how deep into something you go. ]
| 4b) |
With the lostSoulROL
movie clip open; on your timeline, in the lower left
corner, just above the stage, there are two small icons,
a white semi square with a plus symbol on it, and a blue
semi square with a zig zag and a smaller plus symbol on
it. Click on the white square to create a new layer.
Layer 2 will appear above Layer 1 on the timeline. Click
on this button 14 more times to make a total of 16
layers. If you make too many layers, the trash can icon
to the right of the layer creation icons, will delete
what ever layer you have selected. |
Positioning help.. Just hints, not
necessary
4a1) Select the hand tool. Click and
drag the stage until the black square, of the "on-stage"
area is just below the frame of the timeline. Move the
mouse cursor over the edge of the frame. When the cursor
changes to the double arrows, you can drag the timeline
frame downward. The on-stage area moves in relation to
this frame border. Make enough room so that you can see
all of the layers without using the scroll bars in the
timeline. This project also happens to be short so you
don't need a big stage area.
4a2) Select the magnifying glass
tool. Click on the stage above and to the left of your
text, and holding the mouse button down, drag a square
which encompasses all of the letters.
This layout, with a tall timeline
section, and a short stage section is pretty much the
standard from here on. We need to be able to move between
layers quickly. The end result is a screen layout like
those in my diagrams.
| 4b) |
Double click on the Layer
1 label.. It should open up an input dialogue which will
let you name the layer. Name it lightL. |
| 4c) |
Repeat this for each
layer, the first eight layers being named "light"
followed with no spaces the next letter in the word. For
the last eight, just name them by letter. See below. |
| 4d) |
Save your work
Ctrl+S, or Ctrl+Shift+S |
Separating the Elements onto the Layers
| 5a) |
Using the black arrow
tool, click in a blank part of the stage. It's a good
practice to do this before selecting elements like fills
and lines. If the layer is still selected from a
previous step, you can end up moving things that you
don't wish to. |
| 5b) |
Now drag a square around
the first letter. It should fill in with a speckled
gray, representing that it is selected. Choose menu
option Edit/Cut. |
| 5c) |
In your timeline, click
on layer lightL, frame one to select it. Choose
menu option Edit/Paste in Place. |
| 5d) |
In your timeline, select
layer L, frame one. Choose menu option
Edit/Paste in Place. |
| 5e) |
Repeat this process for
each letter, placing each in frame one of both it's
light layer, and it's non-light layer. |
| |
|
|
As I work, I find it
very important to use the locked and unlocked settings
for the layers. When the over lap like this, and you're
looking at all of them in place, it can get pretty
confusing. Lock the layer you just edited, then unlock
the layer below it. Layer o. Cycle down all eight of the
"light" layers. Creating the same line structures. At
this point, don't worry about how long to make them.
Just make sure that the lines butt up against each
other. They should if you've got the "snap to object"
function on. Check out your corners with a magnifying
glass just to make sure they are sharp and together.
There will be an opportunity later to change around how
long they are, so don't waist too much time on that.
Make sure that the end of the left most letter, in this
case our capital "L", is the longest of the line
lengths. The "o" should be a little shorter, etc.
In this example I've
also clicked on the "eye" check mark which makes those
layers invisible. This ensures that they will not get in
the way while we create our light effects.
Note the small circles
of black on the first frame of each layer. These
represent that these frames have some type of element in
them, whether it be fills, lines, a Flash object like a
button or a Movie Clip, or some sort of imported media
like a sound file or a jpg. These are called
keyframes, and they also represent places in the
timeline where you can change and manipulate media. We
will be talking about keyframes a lot. For now, it's
just important to note that when I say keyframe, you
know to look for a dot in a frame. |
|
5f) |
Save your work Ctrl+S, or Ctrl+Shift+S |
Converting the
elements into graphics and groups
6a) In the
timeline, select layer lightL, frame one. Hit F8
or use menu option Insert/Convert to symbol, to make
it a Flash object. In the dialogue box, type in the same
name as the layer name ie lightL. Click on Graphic,
and hit OK.
6b) Repeat this
step for all eight light layers. Be careful in that
dialogue box. Default setting is Movie Clip.. Be sure
to choose Graphic.
In the
case of repeated letters like the second s and o, I named
them s1 and s2; o1 and o2. The names are not really
important at all, but you have to name them something so
try to make it discriptive of what it is.
6c) In the
timeline, select layer L, frame one. NOT layer
lightL. Hit Ctrl+G or use menu option
Modify/Group, to make it a Flash group. We will not be
using these for anything other than stationary objects, but
fills should be grouped as there is a rumor that they take
up more bytes UN-grouped I'm not sure about that, but it
doesn't hurt to group them. Groups do not have to be named.
6d) Repeat this
step for all eight non light layers.
6e) Save
your work Ctrl+S, or Ctrl+Shift+S If you
haven't yet, you probebly should save this under a new file
name.
Creating the Lights: Step One - Outlines
| 7a) |
This is the hardest step
in this part of the process, as such, here are some
hints on prepping the stage area to minimize on head
aches later on. |
Choose menu option View/Grid/Edit
Grid. In the grid properties box which comes up change
the grid to 8 pixels by 8 pixels. Select view grid
but make sure snap to grid is not checked. Click
OK.
Choose menu option Edit/Snap To
Objects if it is not already checked.
Lock all the non light layers. By
clicking on the lock symbol to the right of the layer
name. We don't need to manipulate them right now, and if
you have them open, you might accidentally edit one of
them instead of the light symbols. It is good practice to
lock and unlock layers while manipulating various elements
which are close to each other on the stage.
Something to note going into this. The
"lightS" layer is the center. Because of this, it has no
tween. Until I mention this layer again, don't perform
any of these things to it unless I specifically tell you
to. For this reason you can lock both the S
layer, and the lightS layer now.
| 7b) |
On the stage,
double click on the L to open up it's edit in place
feature. (Remember to check your tabs.) You should zoom
in just enough to get a clear look at the letters. |
| 7c) |
Select your line tool. In
the stroke color swatch, choose a bright green color for
your line. (I choose bright green, but it could be
any color other than white.. that you can see well.)
From the top of the letter L but as far right on
the letter as you can get, draw a line out to the left
edge of the stage. See diagram below. |
| 7d) |
Draw another line from
the bottom of the letter, as far to the right of the
letter you can get, out to just below the end of the
other line, again with a tilt down, instead of upwards. |
| 7e) |
Draw one last line from
the top line ending point, to the bottom line's ending
point. See below if you need a little better idea: |
|
7f) |
Repeat this process for each letter. Make sure that
you're inside that symbol. You have to keep looking at
those tabs, and know your Graphic symbol names. |
|
7g) |
Save
your work Ctrl+S, or Ctrl+Shift+S |
|
