Flash Site Design - Creating Website in Flash

Author

Creating Website in Flash

kirstyburgoine

2006-11-05, 10:33 pm

Hi,
I'm trying to create a website for a new brand of guitars in Flash. The site
has to have the same feel as the brochure we had created by a professional
design agency.

I have been supplied with a flat tiff file of the 2 page spreads used to show
the guitars in the brochure. What I want to do is when you click on any guitar
on that page the rest of the page to fades out leaving just that guitar
showing. Then as you roll over parts of the guitar close ups show with some
detail about the spec.

I'm stuck because I can't think of a way to make the whole page fade out to
leave just the one guitar. I'm used to using Photoshop where I would use the
pen tool to draw around the specific guitar, then turn the path into a
selection and then drop the opacity of the background. Is there something
similar I can do in Flash?

I've tried laying a gif image with transparent background on the layer above
and then motion tweening the background layer so it fades out but the gif file
has jagged edges that look awful.

I'm sure there must be a way to achieve this I just can't think how.

Thanks
Kirsty

Andrew Davis

2006-11-05, 10:33 pm

use png instead of gif, it supports alpha transparency. however, it will
make your flash file much larger. might not be an issue if the images
arent that large...

better to load the images dynamically, as needed. flash 8 supports
loading of png i think, so youre set there...

kirstyburgoine wrote:
> Hi,
> I'm trying to create a website for a new brand of guitars in Flash. The site
> has to have the same feel as the brochure we had created by a professional
> design agency.
>
> I have been supplied with a flat tiff file of the 2 page spreads used to show
> the guitars in the brochure. What I want to do is when you click on any guitar
> on that page the rest of the page to fades out leaving just that guitar
> showing. Then as you roll over parts of the guitar close ups show with some
> detail about the spec.
>
> I'm stuck because I can't think of a way to make the whole page fade out to
> leave just the one guitar. I'm used to using Photoshop where I would use the
> pen tool to draw around the specific guitar, then turn the path into a
> selection and then drop the opacity of the background. Is there something
> similar I can do in Flash?
>
> I've tried laying a gif image with transparent background on the layer above
> and then motion tweening the background layer so it fades out but the gif file
> has jagged edges that look awful.
>
> I'm sure there must be a way to achieve this I just can't think how.
>
> Thanks
> Kirsty
>

droopy.ro

2006-11-05, 10:33 pm

Hello,
i will try to tell you how i would do this. but it's going to be very
difficult if you haven't worked in flash 'till now.
first of all you have to separate all the elements you want to use, like
guitar from the background, the parts of the guitar individually, and
everything else. then you have to make everyone of them movieclips so you can
work with them.

i will try to explain the fade out effect, i hope you will understand. ok..
let's say that the guitar's instance name is [i]guitar_mc[/i] , and the
background's instance name is [i]background_mc[/i] . you must have two frames
to make this effect possible. in the first frame's actions pannel type this:

[i]guitar_mc.onRollOver = function() {
varFadeOut=1;
}
guitar_mc.onRollOut = function() {
varFadeOut=0;
}
if (varFadeOut==1 && background_mc._alpha>0) {
background_mc._alpha-=10;
} else if (varFadeOut==0 && background_mc._alpha<100) {
background_mc._alpha+=10;
}[/i]

and on the second frame this code:
[i]this.gotoAndPlay(_currentframe-1)[/i]

the code should work, although i haven't tested it, and i also hope you
understand something out of it.
i still suggest you ask someone that knows flash to do this, or you should try
and do it your on "photoshop way" without all this effects. after all no one
needs a web site that doesn't work at all.

if you have any other problems, or the code's not working, let me know, you
can contact me by my email address or send me a private message on the
forum(but make sure you leave your email address in the message).
my email: droopy@droopy.ro