Help Achieving an Effect

[gamingPC]

http://www.wayserv.net/

the bar.

you see how at the start,on the right side,the Computers kind of draw themselves.

i couldn"t stop myself and Decompiled it.
i saw a bunch of masks.(3-4).
there in yellow and have wierd unGeographical Shapes.

nothing there with drawing.
all the KeyFrames look more or less the same.
what am i missing?
perhaps the Effect was achieved with some sort of program?

please help me on this imponderable.

no AS,2 or 3 is involved.

with a preThanks,
GamingPC

[Jujumon]

Hi there,

You are not missing anything. It is the basic flash animation using animating masked layer. Basically whatever object (in this case, yellow shape) place in this masked layer will hide the object in the lower layer (the red bar).

try this for your flash:
-create 2 layers
-draw any shape and place on each layer, same position.
-to go top layer and right click, convert layer to mask.

when u play u will see that the top shape masks out bottom shape
You can then animate the masked shape by using keyframe.

google for more details
good luck

[gamingPC]

Hi there,

You are not missing anything. It is the basic flash animation using animating masked layer. Basically whatever object (in this case, yellow shape) place in this masked layer will hide the object in the lower layer (the red bar).

try this for your flash:
-create 2 layers
-draw any shape and place on each layer, same position.
-to go top layer and right click, convert layer to mask.

when u play u will see that the top shape masks out bottom shape
You can then animate the masked shape by using keyframe.

google for more details
good luck

i know what masks are.
i just cant understand how to achieve this effect.
did he make a layer with lines of the Computer and mask that?
something is telling me he didnt,i want to know how he did that effect.

[Jujumon]

sorry, i missed the Computer part

so.. are there Computer bitmaps in there as well? I can't tell exactly how they did it as i dont have decomplier, but i guess one way of doing it is just that...mask the line.

[goliard]

This is how I'd do it:

1) A light grey background layer
2) On top of that, an animated white bar sweeping up and down (about 50% transparent)
3) Next, a mask layer the same size as each computer
4) Finally, a top layer of slightly transparent computers with an opaque background

Haven't tried this out, but it's quite simple and it should work OK.

[gamingPC]

This is how I'd do it:

1) A light grey background layer
2) On top of that, an animated white bar sweeping up and down (about 50% transparent)
3) Next, a mask layer the same size as each computer
4) Finally, a top layer of slightly transparent computers with an opaque background

Haven't tried this out, but it's quite simple and it should work OK.

i would REALLY appreciate if you could upload a .Fla and do this on anything you want to.

(since i didnt really understand)

[Jujumon]

here is my attempt with masking lines.

the thing is, this way you have to know how to use shape hints to make it work.

goodluck

[gamingPC]

here is my attempt with masking lines.

the thing is, this way you have to know how to use shape hints to make it work.

goodluck

wow.
that really does get the same effect.

my question is:
1.
so suppose i had a picture that also has INTERNAL lines,like the cimputer in the example i gave,how exactly could i make the lines for it?
is there some automated way or at least easy was to do this?

(maybe the RED part of the computer is something diffrent and not in the Computer Bitmap?)

[Jujumon]

you would just need 2 more upper layers of internal lines and its mask.

i dont know any other easier way to do this , sorry

[gamingPC]

you would just need 2 more upper layers of internal lines and its mask.

i dont know any other easier way to do this , sorry

ok.
but how exactly do i create these lines?
just regular drawing? the lines wont be straight that way.

[flashpipe1]

For effects like this, I usually just take my image into Illustrator and hand draw the lines over the top. Sometimes, if they're really straight, obvious lines, you can take them into Photoshop, make some brightness/contrast adjustments and get lines that you can Live Trace in Illustrator...

That's what I managed to do on the opening animation at:
http://purcellconstruction.com/

Don't know of any "automated" way to do this...

Hope that helps...

[gamingPC]

For effects like this, I usually just take my image into Illustrator and hand draw the lines over the top. Sometimes, if they're really straight, obvious lines, you can take them into Photoshop, make some brightness/contrast adjustments and get lines that you can Live Trace in Illustrator...

That's what I managed to do on the opening animation at:
http://purcellconstruction.com/

Don't know of any "automated" way to do this...

Hope that helps...

first of all,that came out real nice.
is illustraitor better? (i never used illustrator.)
is it true illustrator does vector based images?
whats Live Trace?

[flashpipe1]

Illustrator is primarily a vector development tool (although it handles raster objects as well) and works very well with Flash. The more recent versions let you copy and paste between the two programs which is very handy.

I generally use Illustrator to handle any of the more detailed vector art I need to do, Photoshop for the raster art and Flash for the basic vector drawing.

Live Trace is a tool in Illustrator that lets you "convert" a raster image to vectors. If you use it for things like lines, highlights, etc. it can be very effective and keep file sizes small. If you use it on more complex images, you can end up with very large vector files so you have to be careful with that.

Hope that helps!