Adobe Flash CS4 Training: Antall Training

Introduction to Adobe Flash CS4 (3-5 days)

Adobe Flash is a very powerful tool that allow you to add animation to you site. Additionally, Flash can be used to build interesting navigation systems and other images. In this class you will learn how to use Flash's drawing tools to build graphics. Then, using its timeline, you will master Motion Tweening and learn good usage of the Library. With an introduction to ActionScript, ou will even build a Flash-based navigation system and insert it into a small HTML site.

All participants will receive a copy of Flash CS4 Digital Classroom by Fred Gerantabee and the AGI Creative Team.

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Course Outline

Lesson 1: What’s New in Adobe Flash CS4?

Testing the waters
New animation engine
Motion Presets
The Motion Editor
New easing behaviors
New drawing tools: The Deco and Spray Brush tools
The 3D Rotation and 3D Translation tools
Inverse Kinematics: The new Bone and Bind tools
New CS4 interface
New F4V video format
Adobe Media Encoder

Lesson 2: Flash CS4 Jumpstart

What is Flash?
About Flash Player
Flash file types
Creating a new document
Setting up your new document 2
Saving your Flash document
Opening documents
The Flash workspace
The Stage and work area
The Flash Tools panel
The Property Inspector
Panels and panel groups
The Timeline
Practicing with the Flash tools
The drawing and selection tools in action
Using gradient and color tools
Animation in action
Getting help
Support forums

Lesson 3: Getting Started with the Drawing Tools

Drawing in Flash
Using the Merge Drawing model
Creating artwork in Merged
Drawing mode
Working with Drawing Objects
Putting it all together
Using the Line tool
Using the Pen tool
Using the Add and Delete Anchor
Point tools
Using the Combine Objects menu
Using the Primitive tools (Smart Shapes)
Using the Oval Primitive tool
The Rectangle Primitive tool
Adding text to your artwork
Adding filters
Working with colors
Getting set up
Creating gradients
Using opacity with gradient colors
Creating custom colors
Saving a custom color set
Organizing and layering graphics
Working with layers
Arranging, locking, and hiding layers
Creating layer folders
Transforming graphics
The Transform menu and
Free Transform tool
The Transform panel
Transforming gradients

Lesson 4: Using Symbols and the Library

Starting up
What are symbols?
A look at the Library panel
Creating symbols
Converting a graphic to a symbol
Creating blank symbols
Building artwork with symbol instances
Positioning and snapping
in symbol instances
Editing and duplicating symbols
Editing symbols in place
Modifying individual symbol instances
Modifying instance color
Fine-tuning your background
Duplicating symbols
Adding graphics and
text to your banner
Swapping symbols
Managing the Library
Organizing symbols with folders
The Move To command
Deleting items from the library
Controlling library views

Lesson 5: Advanced Tools

Working with gradients
Adjusting gradients with the
Gradient Transform tool
New Flash CS4 tools for
advanced drawing
Spraying symbols
Masking
Introducing the Deco tool
Advanced Deco tool techniques
Introduction to IK tools

Lesson 6: Creating Basic Animation

Introducing keyframes and the Timeline
Layers
Frames and keyframes
Building animation: Enter the tween
New: Tween layers and
automatic keyframing
Tweening multiple objects
Previewing animation with Test Movie
Moving and transforming tween paths
Incorporating color effects and scaling
New: Introducing the Motion Editor
Modifying the animation
using the Motion Editor
Tweening rotation
Controlling animation paths
Where did Motion Guide layers go?
What happens to my existing Flash
files that use Motion Guide layers?
How do I create a motion
guide if I still want to?
Morphing graphics and
colors with shape tweens
Shape tween basics
Legacy techniques: Creating classic tweens
Adding color effects and
scaling to a classic tween
(Re)creating motion guides
for classic tweens
Troubleshooting Motion Guides
Adjusting animation with onion skinning
Looking ahead

Lesson 7: Advanced Animation

Copying, pasting, and saving animation
Using Copy and Paste Motion
New: Creating Motion Presets
Applying Advanced Easing Behavior
Animating Masks
Creating Animation with IK Poses
Sequencing Animation
Shifting, Moving, and Extending
Tween Spans
New: Rendering and Animating in 3D
The 3D Rotation tool
The 3D Translation tool
Fine-Tuning Tweens with
the Motion Editor
Adding shape tweens
and shape hints
Creating Shape Hints

Lesson 8: Customizing Your Workflow

Customizing workspace layouts
Opening the completed file
Working with panels
Collapsing and storing panels
Managing workspaces
Setting preferences
Keyboard shortcuts
Visual aids for alignment
Rulers and guides
Guide layers
Advanced alignment
Refining your aligned objects

Lesson 9: Working with Imported Files

Import formats
Importing still images
Viewing the completed lesson file
Import a bitmap image
Adding text
Swapping out an imported file
Modifying imported artwork
Updating imported files
Importing Photoshop files
Importing a layered Photoshop file
Importing Illustrator artwork
Animating the bat

Lesson 10: Introducing ActionScript

Exploring the lesson file
What is ActionScript?
ActionScript 2.0 or 3.0:
Which should you use?
An important note about Publish settings
The Actions panel at work
Standard (default) script editing mode
Using Script Assist
Adding & removing actions
Adding actions to frames
Using stop( )
Using the goto action to
navigate the Timeline
Controlling Movie Clip Timelines
Functions

Lesson 11: Creating Button Symbols

Working with button symbols
Building buttons
Adding text to a button
Duplicating and modifying buttons
Creating text-based buttons
Creating frame labels for ActionScript
Adding ActionScript: Events and event handlers
Understanding events
Responding to events with event handlers
Tying it all together with event listeners
Linking buttons to specific frames
Adding an event listener to a button
Linking buttons to a web site
Introducing navigateToURL( )
and URLRequest( )

Lesson 12: Adding Sound to Your Movies

Preparing sound files for Flash
Sample rate and bit depth
Editing your audio
Mono or stereo
Audio file formats
Importing sounds
Placing sounds on the Timeline
Adding sound to your slide show project
Adding the remaining narration
Adding sound effects to buttons
Placing Event sounds on button frames
Controlling sounds
Editing sounds
Trimming sound
Controlling sounds
Repeating and looping sounds
Looping sounds
Introducing the SoundMixer and stopAll( )
More sync menu controls: stop and start
Start sounds
Stop sounds
Sound publishing options

Lesson 13: Introducing Movie Clips

About movie clips
Creating movie clips
Laying the foundation:
Your first movie clip
Previewing movie clip animation
from the main Timeline
Creating the landing gear
Combining movie clips and
main Timeline animation
Nesting movie clips
Adding ActionScript to movie clip Timelines
Controlling movie clip playback
Adding some variation to the propellers
Tweening movie clips
Adding a second tween
Combining movie clips for
complex animation
Adding filter effects to movie clips
Using the Filters panel
Creating a filter effect

Lesson 14: Working with Video

Video in Flash: formats and fundamentals
Understanding video
Embedded versus linked video
The Flash Video format
Understanding codecs
Understanding the Adobe Media Encoder
Converting video with the
Adobe Media Encoder
Working with embedded video
Adding embedded video to the Timeline
Building controls for embedded video
The Bandwidth Profiler
Working with linked video
Adding cue points in the
Adobe Media Encoder
Adding linked video to the Timeline
Working with the FLVPlayback component

Lesson 15: Delivering Your Final Movie

The publishing process
Publishing to the web
Customizing the Publish settings
CD-ROM delivery
Creating a standalone projector
Make a full-screen projector
Using Export Movie
An overview of FTP
Using Adobe Device Central in Flash

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Introduction to Adobe Flash CS4 (3-5 days)

Also see our live eLearning Flash Training...

Course Outline

See also

Adobe Flash CS4 Training Courses

Adobe Flash CS3 Training Courses