01. Introduction to Timeline Effects 02. Timeline Helpers 03. Assistants 04. Effects 05. Transform/Transition

06. Applying multiple effects  07. Behaviors: controversial interactivity 1  08. Behaviors: controversial interactivity 2  09. Behaviors: controversial interactivity 3  10. Wrap up

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01. Introduction to Timeline Effects and Behaviors

Every new version of Flash seems to offer something new and exciting for us Flash geeks, and Flash MX 2004 is no exception! In this article I am going to take you through a couple of the coolest features of this latest version of Flash MX, Timeline Effects and Behaviors, and I'll show you some simple examples to help you get started with these features quickly.

Before we start on the tutorial, make sure you download the source files and unzip them into your working directory. Now let's dig into these new features...

The Lowdown...

Before we start creating anything, I want to give you a brief low down on where these new features come from. In Flash MX 2004, Macromedia has built a JavaScript interpreter. Yes, you read that correctly. JavaScript, or Flash JavaScript to be more precise (also known as JSAPI), can now be used to do all sorts of fun things while authoring in Flash MX 2004. Aside from enabling you to write some pretty advanced macros to control nearly all of the features of the Flash authoring environment, Macromedia has created several specific uses for Flash JavaScript to make common tasks and effects easier to apply while you create that next great Flash movie; Timeline Effects and Behaviors. Timeline Effects are used to automate animation and other types of visual effects for movie clips on the stage like adding a drop shadow to a movie clip or applying a transition animation to it. Behaviors are used to apply ActionScript functionality to clips on the stage without the need to deal with the ActionScript panel. Behaviors essentially replace the need for the Novice Mode in the Actions Panel from the previous version of Flash MX and give you some pretty advance functionality that can be applied and adjusted by simply pointing and clicking.

OK, enough dilly-dallying, lets start playing...

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