Flash Printing Options

Hello,

I'm trying to create something for my workplace. I have Flash MX 2004. What I am trying to do, is generate a layout to specifically print on certain spots on a page. Mush like printing information onto a form. I was having a little trouble lining everything up correctly. I finally got the printing to work. The only thing I had to do, was change it to borderless printing... Which is fine for my InkJet at home, but I just found out, I do not have that option on the laserjet at work. When printing, it resizes the flash frame in order to fit on the page without clipping...So...

I didn't use any actionscript for the printing, I simply just selected file>>print, then changed the settings... What I first had in mind was to have the flash movie create or be abl;e to save as a JPG from the projector, or swf... In order to open it in windows picture viewer and print with the clipping... But as far as I know, it isnt possible... So my next thought was maybe there is a way in flash's acionscript to print it with the correct settings.. I am not sure if there is some sort of universal print size for printers, and I doubt there is, or else I would just resize the acual flash document to fit it, but I don't think different printers will print it out the same...

So does anyone know of a way to change the print settings with actionscript to print my 8.5x11 flash document WITHOUT resizing. Clipping is fine, the outer area of the document is mainly blank... But I need the content to stay in the same exact position on the printed page...

Thanks,
~Bill

Flash can print whatever wherever and it does it in smooth vector (unless you force it to print in bitmap dots)

Laserjet and inkjet will print the same. You want to set up a print page - an 8.5x11 ratio box, and put whatever you want to print inside the box. Put your box and everything to print inside a clip.

In your print clip you have two main frames - one that sizes your printout marked by a #b - and one (or more) frames to actually print marked by #p

so whatever is in the #b frame will be resized to fit into an 8.5x11 page. then, whatever is in the #p frame is actually printed at the same resizing used to fit the #b frame in. the content of the #b frame is not printed. you can put as many #p frames as you want and each will print on a seperate page.

so if you draw an 850 x 1100 pixel square, mark it as #b, then put a little box in the bottom right corner on the next frame and mark it as #p, when you print it, youll get the little box in the same relative position with same relative size to the #b frame

does that clear it up a bit?

I had a flash-film where Yo should dress a Christmas tree. It was a Christmas clean Christmas tree an there were different things that You could dress the tree by drag and drop. I wanted to be able to print the tree when it was finished. But I had problems. When using this "print-box" the print was of the undressed tree and the things beside. so I had to print the whole flash-film instead to make it work.
Any specific codes when the user should change the film before printing?

i'd suggest, like i did, playing with very simple printouts to get control of it.

make a clip, inside the clip put a few frames and layers with a stop frame at the last one. draw a square outline on one frame, draw a circle on the next, mark first with #b, mark second with #p, put in a simple print command in the _root that "bmovie" prints the clip.

i've got database driven printouts with photos and imported logos on my sites. flash printouts are far superior to html/browser printouts. get good at them and they'll help you sell your work.

Hey, thanks for the advice, I had tried what you said, and unfortunatly, no dice...

I understand that printing it that way will keep everything proportional. But I need the printing to be exact on paper. for example. If I printed something on my inkjet with borderless printing, it comes out exactly how I see it in my flash movie. But if I use that method, the printing is resized and slightly different than what is in the flash movie.

A 1 px line surrounding an 8.5 x 11 flash movie would be printed a little bit smaller, because flash wants it to print the whole movie rather than clipping it.

Is there any other methods that you know of?

Thanks,
~Bill

not sure which part you dont get yet. it does come out exactly as looks in flash or as you program it. yes it's resized, but it's resize proportionally which is what we all want. It's all Xs and Ys like it should be.

it's an 8.5 x 11 box that i use. if you're talking about an outline, that's not a shape. i suggest you stick with shapes so you get what you're looking at.

post your flash. export to version 7 if you're on 8 please.

I do understand that I want to keep it proportional. but I NEED it to print out exact to the flash. If I have a line an inch away from the side of the flash movie, I will need it to end up exactly an inch from the edge of the paper, which works with my borderless printing. But at my workplace, i would be printing on a laser printer with has no kinds of borderless printing, whilst in flash. I can achieve the borerless printing from windows picture and fax viewer, it simply crops the image to fit the page exactly as the image is.

Think of a paper that is gridded, and I want to print a circle in the EXACT center of each square... I was trying to figure out a way to print it like that through flash, because I cannot save the flash file as a jpeg to print it in windows picture and fax viewer. Well, I can't do that without the flash editor on their computer...

I'm starting to think that this wont work exactly how I need it to :-\...

Well, if you do know of any ideas please let me in :).

Thanks for all the help thusfar,
~Bill

there are no inches, only pixels and percents. printer's borders are set by the user and you have no control. the borders are pretty much the same for ink and laser when opened from box.

did you ever test a simple box outline like i suggested? the box didnt printout the same on both?