General questions about slightly animated flash christmascard.

Hey,

I'm completely new to flash & digital art. I got a project recently for a christmas card. Basically a digital drawing with some flash animation edited into it.

The rough sketch can be seen here:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7010/6...4300d555_b.jpg

Though I just have a slightest idea based on youtube videos of how to do it. Here's what I think I could do (correct me, if wrong):
1)Make the background image in PS as a digital painting
2)Make the characters into vectors in Illustrator.
3)Make the further frames/moving parts of character in Illustrator as well
4)Export the whole thing into Adobe Flash
5)Make it happend.

a)Does my plan have potential?(Though I can finally be sure of it in practice.)
b)What flash format to use to create it, considerint that it'll be used in web, sent out as emails? (There are a number of things in there -Action Script, AIR etc)
c)Any tips for a beginner?

I was planning to use a similar technique used in this tutorial:

All the best,
Andrew

If you want things (characters) to be animated..

you should make them separate objects.

Using vector graphics will allow for easier editing and smooth transitions/animations.

anything that will NOT move or be static (can be an image of whatever).

however vector illustrations will make the project smaller in size vs importing raster/bitmap graphics.

more or less you have the right idea..

just get to playing with it.. and post pack if you have specific questions or problems.

You don't need to animate this - the image tells the whole story - very nice!

However ...
as a tip, I used to spend hours making things in illustrator then exporting them to flash and animating them. Now I just make them in flash, if you have CS5 and you are not doing very complex lines (its all about the lines) I find it much easier.

i found some good links in flashkit.com regarding your matter. I recommend you to search your issue and find the tutorials.