Video:How to Create an Animation in Flash

Transcript:How to Create an Animation in Flash

Hi, I'm Mark Zamora, animation expert, here for About.com. In this screencast, I'll show you how to create a basic animation in Flash.

Starting an Animation in Flash

When you start up Flash, it'll show you a blank canvas, with on the left a tools panel, in the middle a work area, and at the top the timeline. Let's try to draw something! In the tools panel, let's click the oval tool. Below the tools are two color windows, one represents the stroke, the other the fill. I'm setting my stroke to blue, and my fill to light blue. Now, I'll draw a small circle by just clicking and dragging.

More Instructions for Animations in Flash

Now, let's take a look at our timeline. It's divided in two columns: the layers and the timeline itself - which is divided into frames. This red line shows your current position. The timeline also shows you how many layers you have, as you can see - right now we have one. The first frame of the timeline is gray with a small black dot- we call this a key frame, and it's automatically created when you draw on that frame.

Notes About Animations in Flash

If you want to animate, you always have to define keyframes, they are the beginning and end points. Another thing you need to know is Flash doesn't animate ordinary shapes, they have to be converted to symbols. Just right-click on the circle, and select "Convert to Symbol" - select "graphic" and click "Ok" Now, we can start animating! Let's click onanother frame, the 10th for example. Right-click on it, and "insert keyframe."

Additional Notes About Animations in Flash

Now, this keyframe is gray with a dot as well, and the space between the two keyframes is grey. This small white square indicates there is no motion yet. In order to create some motion, let's first move our circle while still on frame 10. Just drag it anywhere on your canvas. Now, to apply your motion tween, click and drag from frame 1 to 10 to select them, right-lcick and select "create motion tween" And that's it! To play your animation, just press the Enter key on the timeline.

For more on animation, be sure to visit Compute.About.com. Thanks for watching!