This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Did You Know?
Right-click (Option-click on the Mac) shapes to quickly access the transforming options otherwise available from the main menu. The motion is far faster than using the drop-down lists at the top of your screen.
Get comfortable with the Arrow tool, not just for selecting items, but for manipulating curves and shapes. Work with various shapes to see how the fill behaves when you change the containing stroke. Overlapping stroke segments do not carry a fill with them.
Smoothing and straightening can speed up your final movie playback. For more advanced smoothing options, try the Optimize command under Modify in the main menu.
Two ways exist to manipulate curves in Flash. Using the Arrow tool, you can grab and adjust any line segment into new shapes. Or you can use the Pen and Subselect tools to manipulate anchor points and control handles, changing or creating curves.
Double-click a line to select all other lines that join or intersect it. Selection is indicated by small, white dots that appear on the segment.
Unlike some other software packages, you do not need to complete a loop with the Lasso tool to select an area. The Lasso draws a closing line between your starting point and ending point in both freeform and polygon modes.