Best Flash Animation Software. How to create flash animation. Comparison of the free version of the flash editor Advanced Effect Maker Free Edition with the commercial version of the Commercial Edition
Have you ever wondered what is hidden behind the beautiful animation of banners on the Internet? Or newfangled cartoons created using computer technology? Most often, they are based on "flesh", or rather, this is how the name of the Flash technology is translated from English. Today we will talk about flash animation for the site:
Flash technology
The multimedia framework was developed by Macromedia. But after its acquisition (merger), all rights to the technology were transferred to the new owner - Adobe Systems.
The area of modern use of Adobe Flash:
- Creation of web applications is a fairly new direction. Includes full or partial use of Flash to create websites. With partial application, this technology creates individual elements design: various interactive menus, animated buttons, etc.
Compared to conventional html-based resources, flash sites have some features that limit their use. These include the high cost of development, demanding server resources, long download times with slow Internet connections, and some other aspects:
- Implementation of multimedia capabilities - for listening to audio and playing video on sites, media players created on the basis of Flash are often used. Their development includes the use of one of the scripting languages (more often JavaScript):
- In online advertising, the technology is most often used to create animated banners. They imply not only the playing of multimedia advertisements, but also some kind of interaction with the user based on a game.
Flash development basics and tools
To create Flash animations, the traditional tools from Adobe are most often used:
- Adobe Flash Professional - a program for creating interactive animation (animator);
- Adobe Flash Builder - an environment for creating a web application interface;
- Adobe Flash Player- a player integrated into the browser for playing Flash.
In addition to it, a number of multimedia content of this type can be played third party applications... The most popular of these are Gnash, QuickTime, and a few others:
This technology allows you to display any type of graphics ( raster, vector, 3D). And also supports streaming audio and video data. Specially for mobile devices a lightweight Flash version Lite.
The main standard for Flash files is the SWF extension. The abbreviation stands for Small Web Format. Video recorded in Flash has file extensions FLV, F4V.
Vector graphics are at the heart of the development of interactive animation on Flash. It was thanks to this that it was possible to implement support for the multimedia platform and the independence of the animation quality from the screen resolution.
The file size of the flash application is the same for all users regardless of technical characteristics screen (resolution).
Flash interactive animation is based on morphing (vector type), in which there is a slow flow between keyframes. For data playback, a flash player is used, the work of which is in many ways similar to the work virtual machine JavaScript. The software component of the technology is implemented using the ActionScript language.
The disadvantages of the technology include the following points:
- Heavy load on CPU client machine. This is due to the low efficiency of the flash virtual machine, which is embedded with the player into the user's browser;
- High probability of errors - Flash animation can be played with a high probability of errors. Moreover, crashes in Flash playback negatively affect the operation of everything. client application(browser). This is due to insufficient control of the fault tolerance of the program code when creating flash applications;
- Failure to index - All text content displayed in Flash content does not participate in the indexing process. This limitation is especially problematic for those resources that are based on this technology.
Overview of Third Party Flash Creation Software
Sothink SWF Quicker was taken as a prototype application for demonstrating the basics of creating Flash. According to many professionals, the program is the most understandable and easiest to learn.
In addition to creating and editing, the Flash editor is able to work with all other types of web animation (GIF, HTML and other standards):
After installation, go to the friendly interface of the program. Unfortunately, after wandering through all the nooks and crannies of the interface language switcher, we did not find it.
In order to understand how to make Flash animation in this application, we will use the built-in templates. The "New From Template" dialog box appears immediately after starting the program. In addition, it can be called through the main menu item "File". Among the proposed options, we have chosen to create a banner:
In the next window of the wizard, from the drop-down list, you need to select a template according to which the animation will be created. Below it is a small frame in which the selected template is played:
In the next steps, you need to set the dimensions of the banner and enter 5 phrases of text that will be played in the animation. In addition, you must specify the address of the resource to which the user will be led by clicking on the banner:
After compiling the project and closing the wizard window, you can view the resulting video in the built-in player. To do this, click on the green arrow at the top:
After closing the player, let's take a closer look at the application interface. Please note that it consists of two main windows: the upper one is intended for editing the time interval of the video, and the lower one is a normal one. graphics editor... Each of the elements is located on a separate layer, which can be changed using standard tools located on the side panel.
Free program for creating flash animations using ready-made applets.
Many of you, I think, have ever tried to create your own sites (or maybe you even own a very popular portal).
One way or another, everyone was faced with the problem of the effective design of their web pages. And, as static HTML is gradually becoming a thing of the past, many today are turning their attention to popular technologies such as JavaScript and Flash. They allow you to create beautiful animated dynamic pages with advanced functionality.
It will not be difficult for a specialist to make a small animated flash banner, however, what should the rest of the uninitiated do? If a scrupulous study of programming languages is not included in your immediate plans, then you can, as always, resort to the help of specialized software. Today we will get acquainted with the basics of working in the program Advanced Effect maker .
This utility allows you to create all kinds of flash and JavaScript effects, both your own "from scratch" and based on ready-made templates! Advanced Effect Maker is available in several editions, which differ in the number of ready-made effects and the degree of user freedom. Let's compare the maximum and free configuration:
Comparison of the free version of the flash editor Advanced Effect Maker Free Edition with the commercial version of the Commercial Edition
The biggest drawback of the free version of the program is the presence of a kind of preapploader, which allows you to switch to viewing some ready-made effects only after clicking on the created banner. This is where all the differences, in principle, end :).
Program installation
Installation of Advanced Effect Maker takes place in a standard way, so let's go straight to working with the program:
At the first launch, we will be prompted to familiarize ourselves with the license agreement. To accept it, click the "I agree" button. After that, you can start studying the utility interface:
Interface and work with the editor
In spite of English, everything is simple and clear here. The Advanced Effect Maker window is divided into two parts. There are only two on the left big buttons: the first is to enter the gallery of available effects, and the second is to add additional applets (if you want to buy them;)). On the right side, we see a catalog of available templates with subsections and a preview window, as well as an effect editing area.
To start editing the template you want, just click on its image, and if you just want to see how it works, then click the "Preview" inscription under the picture:
When you open the desired effect, a message about an existing file may appear. If this happens, then we simply ignore it by pressing the "Ok" button:
If the template has opened successfully, we will be able to see several tabs that contain all sorts of settings:
Program settings and animation creation
The first tab is "General". It contains General settings project. Usually these are dimensions (width - width and height - height), name (file name), quality of the future file (quality), and also the mode of the flash movie window (window mode).
The second tab - "Color", as the name implies, is responsible for the colors used in the project. Everything is very clear here, so let's move on to the next one - "Messages":
Here we have two fields. In the first field (on the left), enter the text that we need to display with a special effect, and in the second - the link that the user will follow by clicking on our banner. The advantage of Advanced Effect Maker is that we can enter an unlimited number of lines of text (as well as links), but the main disadvantage is the lack of support for the Russian language :(.
The next two tabs are used to manage fonts (Fonts) and animation properties (Others), respectively. One caveat: if you want to use alternative TTF fonts, you will have to convert them first for compatibility with Advanced Effect Maker. To do this, call the Convert Fonts tool from the Tools menu and, having selected the desired font, press the Convert button:
When all the changes have been made, we can click the "Create Applet" button. After that, two files will be created in the project destination folder: SWF (direct animation) and HTML (contains instructions for embedding the resulting animation into the code of your page:
Saving work results
However, this is not all. With Advanced Effect Maker you can create your own effect based on an existing one, or completely "from scratch"! To do this, go to the "Tools" menu and activate the "Plugin Maker" item:
Here you first need to set a name for the new project, as well as some other parameters (optional). After that, you can press the "Create Applet" button, and we will go directly to the effect editor window:
There are several buttons here that allow you to introduce some standard functions into the scenario of the future effect. The only problem is that all the necessary variables and values will have to be entered manually by yourself, and here you already need some programming skills in ActionScript or JavaScript :(.
conclusions
Advanced Effect Maker may be to the taste of novice web designers, as it allows you to special efforts create quite effective banners, animated menus, slideshows, and even small games (such as tags). The disadvantage in the form of a preapploader (if there is one in the selected effect) can be eliminated using special SWF file decompilers (including free ones);).
Good luck in all your endeavors and creative success!
P.S. It is allowed to freely copy and quote this article, provided that an open active link to the source is indicated and the authorship of Ruslan Tertyshny is preserved.
Free program for creating flash videos of almost any degree of complexity! Includes almost everything necessary tools for everyday work with flash and can be used by both beginners and professionals. The main difference and advantage of this program is the support for ActionScript 2.0, without which it is simply impossible to imagine the creation of professional flash content.
It seems that Dima Bilan is right when he says that the impossible is possible :). Not so long ago, web developers had to either pirate or pay quite a lot of money for the ability to work with flash animation. And finally, the hour came when the third full-fledged option appeared - to use a free flash-editor.
Earlier on our site there was already one similar program, but its disadvantage was some obsolescence, a limited set of tools and the lack of support for the ActionScript programming language, which is so necessary for creating some kind of functional sites, games, etc.
Today I will introduce you to a completely modern flash editor, which can practically compete on an equal footing with the famous Adobe Flash - Vectorian giotto.
Comparison of Vectorian Giotto with its paid counterpart
As you can see, the developers of Vectorian Giotto did their best and tried to fit into their program the maximum possible set of functions similar to Adobe Flash. Besides, most of the "hot" keys are the same, so those who are used to working with Edobovskiy editor will have no difficulty in switching to the free Vectorian Giotto platform!
Well, and for "dessert" in free editor there is also something that the "big brother" sometimes lacks - a built-in library of animation effects that will please especially those who create flash banners.
Preparation for work
To get started with Vectorian Giotto, we need to download the archive with the installer, which, by the way, weighs only 8 megabytes! When the archive is downloaded, open it and run the file VectorianGiotto.exe.
Despite the fact that the installation (and the program itself, sadly :)) is English, it should not cause any difficulties, since it is not necessary to change anything in the default settings. Just click the "Next" button several times and wait for the end of the installation process;).
First acquaintance with the interface
At the end of the installation, if we did not change anything in standard settings, the Vectorian Giotto working window will appear in full screen:
As I already said, the program interface is in English, so in order to avoid misunderstandings and misinterpretations when performing further actions described in the article, I would like to introduce some conceptual apparatus :). Let's start, as usual, from top to bottom and left to right.
Menu bar. This is the panel that contains all the menus of the Vectorian Giotto program. When working with animation, you may need such sections as "File" (to save and export your animation to SWF), "View" (to configure display parameters work area), “Modify” (to control the parameters of the current document and work with the library of effects) and “Window” (to configure the displayed modules and program panels).
Main toolbar. The buttons for managing project actions and the animation playback panel are moved here.
Drawing panel (occupies the entire left part of the program window). Here you will find all the necessary tools to create any desired objects for your animation, as well as buttons that allow you to adjust the parameters of the necessary tools.
Storyboard (or timeline). Allows you to manage cells for frames and created layers.
Color control panel. With its help, you can quickly change the color of previously created shapes. Also serves to select the type of fill for your animation objects (solid, gradient, etc.).
Workspace. It is a virtual sheet of "paper" intended for drawing your animations :).
ActionScript editor. If you need to create not simple banners, but something more complex, including buttons and all kinds of interactive objects, then you cannot do without a script editor.
Clip structure panel. Displays all the shapes that are "in the frame" and allows you to quickly switch between them and control their sequence.
Properties panel. Each object in the flash has certain properties. This panel is used to manage them.
Transformation panel. Allows you to quickly resize and position the selected animation element.
Library of elements. It is a list of created or imported objects that can be (and repeatedly!) Inserted into animation.
On given web this page presents programs for creating and editing flash animation. With their help, you can realize your own ideas into animated videos for your site.
Flash editor Is a program for creating flash animations and editing ready-made flash videos.
FLA format is the source document for your clip. Having opened it, you get into the Macromedia Flash program and can further edit the clip.
SWF format is an executable Flash file, when you click on it, you can view the clip using the Macromedia Flash Player.
Animation with Adobe Flash Professional
Adobe Flash Professional CS3- the advantages and functionality of this program can be described for a very long time. This program is the undisputed leader in the flash technology environment. Adobe Flash Professional is used by both professional website developers and flash designers.
With the help of this program, even the most sick imagination can be realized in a flash. In general, if you decide to create professional animated flash files, then Adobe Flash Professional is exactly the program you cannot do without.
The volume depends on the version from 500 Mb.
On this moment Adobe Flash Professional CS5 - a new version programs for working with animation and multimedia.
OS: Windows XP / Vista / 7
Screenshot of the program:
download Adobe Flash Professional CS3Perhaps for beginner web wizards to create flash animations using Adobe programs Flash Professional will seem like something difficult and out of reach.
In this case, do not despair and give up what you started. Try your flash ideas with Swishmax.
Swishmax - flash editor
SwishMAX Is an alternative program with a friendly and simple interface for create flash-animation, which is less functional than the previous one, but at the same time allows you to get a good quality result. The main advantage of the bottom flash editor is its ease of use. Even a novice user, having video lessons at hand, will be able to create professional flash videos with its help in a short time.
Size: 9.27 MB.
The interface language is Russian.
Operating system: Windows 98 / Me / NT / 2000 / XP
Screenshot of the program:
download Swishmax Alligator Flash Designer
The next flash program is even simpler, both in functionality and in the content of the interface. The capabilities of this flash editor allow you to easily create a flash banner for a website in a matter of minutes.
There are more than 130 effects: fade, zoom, rotation. Animated drawings, shapes or text, and even sound can be easily added to your Flash animation.
Here you can also specify OnClick or OnOver.
Size: 5.3 MB.
The interface language is Russian.
OS: Windows XP / Vista / 7
Screenshot of the program:
download Alligator_Flash_Designer_7.0
Another program that is not a flash animation editor, but its capabilities are necessary for a novice web designer.
Flash decompiler trillix
Flash Decompiler Trillix - the main purpose of this program is to export SWF files back to FLA format with one click of the mouse. Retrieves all Flash objects from SWF file and saves them to a FLA file, which can be further edited in Flash.
The advantage of Flash Decompiler is editing sounds, images, colors, gradients, lines, dynamic texts and links without converting to FLA.
Size: 7.27 MB.
The interface language is Russian.
OS: Windows XP / Vista / 7
Screenshot of the program:
download Flash Decompiler Trillix
October 13, 2014
