Posted: Sat Jul 28, 2007 10:27 am
What vern said.
Optimising content for Flash is a science in itself. One needs to have a deep understanding of Flash's brand of memory management and file structure. Programming skills are useful, too. And then there's still the task to design something which will result in small files in Flash yet animate in an appealing way.
It would be nice to be able to just import AS work into Flash and be done. Unfortunately this makes for big file sizes. Careful planning is needed, a strict sequence of actions, and multiple passes of exporting/importing stuff.
Since I don't know your project, I can just give some general advice:
1. Storyboard.
A 15 min story will have several different scenes. Sort them by background and occuring characters. Make a plan. Does one character be present from start to end (I bet it will)? Then this character, respectively its body parts, will need to be stored in the main flash file (resp. in its library).
Is one character only there for some seconds and then never again? This is a candidate for a subclip, loaded into the main file when needed.
The same goes for backgrounds and props. If needed often, main file library. If needed once, seperate swf, loaded just in time.
2. Understanding symbols.
This really is the magic of Flash file size. If you build something within Flash, you try to create every element just once. You multiply only instances of that object once it is made into a symbol. This works on several levels and even in nested hierarchies.
Example: You create one foot, make it a symbol, create two instances of that foot symbol, flip one: now you have left and right foot. You create a walk cycle, put left and right foot instances into it, make it walk, put that walk cycle away as a movie clip (which is a symbol of another class). You build a scene, put an instance of that walk cycle movie clip ito it, scale it as needed, flip it as needed. No matter how long your animation gets or how often you multiply instances: Flash will still have just one original foot in the file. Of course this principle saves a lot of memory.
AS is different. Learn about the meaning of the red dot in the layer icon: as long as it's there, Flash will treat this layer as one symbol during the whole animation. There's tricks to maintain this state, covered elsewhere.
While importing an AS generated swf to Flash, something awful happens: the whole animation turns into a bunch of symbols and keyframes, clogging up timeline and library. You need to clean that mess up. Create a folder in the library everytime you import animation from AS and put all symbols into that.
Clean up the timeline as well. Flash creates a key for each frame of AS animation, even if there's just a hold. You can safely erase those keys.
Here comes the biggest trap. Imagine you create two scenes in AS (copied from the same character rig source) with the same character doing some stuff. You import one swf into Flash, then the other. What happens is that Flash creates new symbols for the second scene, although it is "the same" content! Imagine you do this for 20 scenes - you'll end up with 20 copies of the same character, and tehre's no way to tell Flash to get rid of duplicates.
Solution: you have to do all animation of one character which will end in the same Flash file in one AS file. "One character" means one set of layers for one view of the body. Import this one AS swf into Flash. Now all 20 scenes will refer to the same set of symbols, saving a lot of memory.
3. Workflow.
I strongly recommend to export and import animation character by character, otherwise you will never be able to tell which symbol belongs to which character in Flash. The same goes for every background or prop.
Of course you took care to use the same low framerate in AS and Flash (something like 12 or 15 fps).
Camera movements are best re-created in Flash, because you'll have less keys than one for every frame.
Planning is everything in a project like this! You'll need a big X-sheet for the whole movie to keep track of which frame number in AS corresponds to a scene and frame number in Flash, where to have holds and repeats which can be erased in Flash, and so on.
4. Memory management.
This is programmer's stuff. He'll be able to advise you how to break up stuff in nice little chunks, which stuff to put into the main file and which stuff just load in time. He will write code to pre-load stuff as well as clear it from memory.
Summary: It is possible to have good and smooth animation in Flash and a small file size too, but it takes an immense amount of work.
Optimising content for Flash is a science in itself. One needs to have a deep understanding of Flash's brand of memory management and file structure. Programming skills are useful, too. And then there's still the task to design something which will result in small files in Flash yet animate in an appealing way.
It would be nice to be able to just import AS work into Flash and be done. Unfortunately this makes for big file sizes. Careful planning is needed, a strict sequence of actions, and multiple passes of exporting/importing stuff.
Since I don't know your project, I can just give some general advice:
1. Storyboard.
A 15 min story will have several different scenes. Sort them by background and occuring characters. Make a plan. Does one character be present from start to end (I bet it will)? Then this character, respectively its body parts, will need to be stored in the main flash file (resp. in its library).
Is one character only there for some seconds and then never again? This is a candidate for a subclip, loaded into the main file when needed.
The same goes for backgrounds and props. If needed often, main file library. If needed once, seperate swf, loaded just in time.
2. Understanding symbols.
This really is the magic of Flash file size. If you build something within Flash, you try to create every element just once. You multiply only instances of that object once it is made into a symbol. This works on several levels and even in nested hierarchies.
Example: You create one foot, make it a symbol, create two instances of that foot symbol, flip one: now you have left and right foot. You create a walk cycle, put left and right foot instances into it, make it walk, put that walk cycle away as a movie clip (which is a symbol of another class). You build a scene, put an instance of that walk cycle movie clip ito it, scale it as needed, flip it as needed. No matter how long your animation gets or how often you multiply instances: Flash will still have just one original foot in the file. Of course this principle saves a lot of memory.
AS is different. Learn about the meaning of the red dot in the layer icon: as long as it's there, Flash will treat this layer as one symbol during the whole animation. There's tricks to maintain this state, covered elsewhere.
While importing an AS generated swf to Flash, something awful happens: the whole animation turns into a bunch of symbols and keyframes, clogging up timeline and library. You need to clean that mess up. Create a folder in the library everytime you import animation from AS and put all symbols into that.
Clean up the timeline as well. Flash creates a key for each frame of AS animation, even if there's just a hold. You can safely erase those keys.
Here comes the biggest trap. Imagine you create two scenes in AS (copied from the same character rig source) with the same character doing some stuff. You import one swf into Flash, then the other. What happens is that Flash creates new symbols for the second scene, although it is "the same" content! Imagine you do this for 20 scenes - you'll end up with 20 copies of the same character, and tehre's no way to tell Flash to get rid of duplicates.
Solution: you have to do all animation of one character which will end in the same Flash file in one AS file. "One character" means one set of layers for one view of the body. Import this one AS swf into Flash. Now all 20 scenes will refer to the same set of symbols, saving a lot of memory.
3. Workflow.
I strongly recommend to export and import animation character by character, otherwise you will never be able to tell which symbol belongs to which character in Flash. The same goes for every background or prop.
Of course you took care to use the same low framerate in AS and Flash (something like 12 or 15 fps).
Camera movements are best re-created in Flash, because you'll have less keys than one for every frame.
Planning is everything in a project like this! You'll need a big X-sheet for the whole movie to keep track of which frame number in AS corresponds to a scene and frame number in Flash, where to have holds and repeats which can be erased in Flash, and so on.
4. Memory management.
This is programmer's stuff. He'll be able to advise you how to break up stuff in nice little chunks, which stuff to put into the main file and which stuff just load in time. He will write code to pre-load stuff as well as clear it from memory.
Summary: It is possible to have good and smooth animation in Flash and a small file size too, but it takes an immense amount of work.
gives me the sweats....