How to make a vector from a photo

[Michel]

Before i started using flash 4 (3 weeks ago now)
I have browsed the internet to see how things are made with flash.

I have seen a simple tutorial on how to make the runningman/walkingman which can be found in the movie section.

Now i want to make such a thing but i can't find the tutorial about it anymore :-(

Does someone know where i can find the tutorial on how to make a vector graphic from a drawing or photo.

------------------
Kind regards from a newbie

[yeenhin]

you can use the trace bitmap in flash 4
there is a great tutorial of how to do that at flashkit... http://www.flashkit.com/tutorials/in...te_trace.shtml

however, it is not recommended to do it with photo because it will make the file size even larger than the original.

hope this help

------------------

[Michel]

I would like to make an effect like on
the movie

Vector Vid
that can be found on:
MOVIES>>>VECTOR VIDEO ANIMATION>>>VECTOR VID

I don't know if this link wil work but here it is:
http://www.flashkit.com/cgi-bin/link...jump.pl?ID=206

------------------
Kind regards from a newbie

[yeenhin]

i asked the same question about that movie about 1 month ago, and i think flashkit give me some instrustions....but i can't remember that whole process...

if i am not mistaken, these are the steps,
1. take a AVI movie,(in the vector vid case, it is a person).
2. use a movie software such as adobe streamline or something(can't remember) and make that AVI movie into frames and export those frame into jpg.
3. use another graphic editing software such as photoshop and convert them in to grayscale/duatone(he might add some distort filter but i am not sure).
4. import all those picture into flash(frame by frame).

I think you can do a search on this board, my question might be still in somewhere of this board.

Hope this help.

[Michel]

Thanks Yeenhin that's more what i hoped to hear :-)

I'll do a search any idea what the topic was ?

------------------
Kind regards from a newbie

[yeenhin]

Sorry, Can't remember my question topic !!!

[Michel]

OK np

i'll check them all

[mgason]

Hi theres a shareware package called smacker available at www.radgametools.com that will convert a video of just about any sort into a series of numbered bitmaps. You can strip out the sound to a seperate file for flash to use as well.

You then create a new movie clip symbol in flash , go import file and select the first bitmap. Flash will say this appears to be a numbered sequence do you wish to import, hit yes and each frame of the video is now a keyframe.

This can be huge, in fact i have crashed flash doing it with a long movie. i advise figuring out which small section of frames you wish to import if your movie is long, just delete the rest before importing.

This will give you video in flash, of course its highly innefficient raster stuff. To make it a lot better, simplify the frames drastically.

To do this you can open each one in photoshop, convert to greyscale, then use the posterize filter to reduce the number of colors to 3 or 4, even 2.

import this to flash and use trace bitmap on each frame, play with the settings to optimise file size, and you have compact (relatively) vector video in flash.

Obviously you should select source video that lends itself to posterization, if thats a real word. you know what I mean, its how most faux video in flash looks.

A fair bit of work but not really difficult.
I found a tutorial on doing the smacker part into flash once, cant locate it again but do have a printout.
Just get the old version of smacker, the newer one has lots you dont need.

feel free to email me if you have questions.

mark
gase@visi.com

[grayrest]

Your life would be easier if you made an action for the photoshop part (just put all your files in one folder and run the action on the folder). I did this same type thing for when doing 3dsMAX movies -> animated gifs (before I discovered flash), and the process was exactly as described. Takes forever, though. I'll have to remember the numbered series... much faster than individual frames.

Thanks yeenhin.

[Michel]

Grayrest, how can i apply that action to a folder with photoshop ?

------------------
Kind regards from a newbie

[mgason]

Yes adding running an action on a folder to my method would remove the last bottleneck. how do you run an action on a complete folder in photoshop, grayrest?

mark