David Stiller’s blog

This topic came up when someone asked me how (if it was possible) to instruct one movie clip to start playing after another has stopped.  For example, the main timeline does its thing, humming along, when it suddenly comes to a keyframe that contains a nested movie clip.  A simple stop() action in that keyframe tells the main timeline to rest where it is, and the nested movie clip starts playing on its own.  When the nested clip hits the last frame of its own timeline … that’s when the main timeline needs to start moving again.  How to do that?

In my reply, I said there were a number of possible ways.  You could set up a loop, for example — MovieClip.onEnterFrame (AS2) or Event.ENTER_FRAME (AS3), maybe setInterval() (AS2) or the Timer class (AS3) — and in that loop, check the current frame of the nested movie clip against the number of its total frames.  In AS2, that would be a comparison of _currentframe to _totalframes; in AS3, currentFrame to totalFrames.  When the former equals the latter, invoke MovieClip.play() on the main timeline and quit the loop.

But much easier than that, and less processor intensive, is simply to put a keyframe script in the last frame of the nested movie clip, telling its parent (the main timeline) to play.  In AS2, that would be this._parent.play();.  In AS3, this.parent.play(); (no underscore on parent).  Ah, but there lies a problem.  The AS3 version, which is technically correct, causes a compiler warning:  1061: Call to a possibly undefined method play through a reference with static type flash.display:DisplayObjectContainer.  What on earth?  Keep reading »

How to pause the main timeline (or any timeline), and how to loop it, are fairly common questions on the Adobe forums — not super hot topics, but they continue to crop up every few months.  I suggested an AS2 approach to both questions in “How to Pause a Timeline (AS2)” and “How to Loop a Movie Three Times (AS2)” in 2006, but now with Flash CS3’s support for ActionScript 3.0, a couple of updates make good sense.

Check out “Using ActionScript to pause and loop the timeline in Flash,” in the Adobe Design Center, to see how things have changed.  Looping, as it turns out, can be handled in practically the same way.  The recommended approach for pausing now calls for the Timer class, which operates very differently from the setInterval() used in AS2.

First of all, I’d like to give a big thanks to everyone who sent in a post card!    Meridian has shown a great interest in maps lately, so (as it happens) we bought her a windshield-sized world map not long ago and had it mounted on foam board.  She’s been noting places we’ve traveled with stick pins, and as post cards started to arrive, we had fun discussing what places they came from.  I really think it’s neat that people visit this blog from over a dozen different countries!

Post cards were deposited into a pillowcase, and Meridian chose one without looking.  The winner was John in Sweden, whom I’ve contacted via email for shipping information.  Here’s the post card drawing in five photos.  Enjoy Moock’s Essential ActionScript 3.0, John — it’s a winner!

This article can be considered a sequel to “How to Load External Flash Video (FLV) Files (AS2).”  The code suggested here is nothing more than the ActionScript 3.0 way to accomplish the same goal achieved earlier; namely, to load an external Flash video (FLV) file at runtime — without using the FLVPlayback component.  To be sure, there’s nothing wrong with FLVPlayback.  Its skins are customizable (all the more so in Flash CS3, which is the first version of Flash to support AS3) and it provides plenty of built-in widgets, such as play/pause, a volume slider, mute button, and the like.  But to get those features, even if you choose a non-skinned component, you pay a 49KB price in an ActionScript 3.0 document.  If you go without the component, it costs you less than 1KB.  That means site visitors can spend their bandwidth on your video content itself, rather than the video player.  Keep reading »

Note:  This contest has now ended, with results posted here.  Thanks for the post cards, everybody!

I’m an admirer of the clarity, thoroughness, and encouraging tone of Colin Moock’s books.  To that end, I pre-ordered his Essential ActionScript 3.0 (O’Reilly) long before it was available and was delighted when it arrived on my doorstep several months later.  Flash forward (pun) from that moment to just over a month ago, when I arrived in Boston for a terrific Flashforward conference.  Kevin Lynch, Adobe Chief Software Architect and keynote speaker, arranged to have a copy of Essential ActionScript 3.0 for every attendee, which was a fantastic and generous gift.  What that means is that I have a mint condition extra copy of Moock’s latest, and I’m happy to give it away.  I’ll pay shipping to anywhere in the world.

If you send me a post card and it gets here between now and November 15, 2007, I’ll have my three-year-old daughter, Meridian, choose randomly from the pile on that date.  I’m hoping three weeks gives everyone a fair chance, whether or not you’re in the US.  I’d love to hear about how this blog has helped you, if it has, but most importantly, I will of course need your return address, email address, or some other handy way to get your shipping address.

Send post cards to:

David Stiller
1700 Gray Slate Court
Virginia Beach, VA  23456

Half a year ago, I wrote a brief article on “How to Play Sound Files Sequentially” (AS2).  Recently, a reader was asking how to apply the same principle to video.  In his case, Paul had to play a commercial first, then follow it with a longer content video — and the user controls (buttons, scrubber, etc.) needed to be disabled wile the commercial was playing.  As it turns out, Paul worked out a solution of his own, partly based on some of the other articles here, but I thought it would be fun to do a quick version too.  That way, he can compare notes and anyone else can look on.  Keep reading »

Only three months after release, Foundation Flash CS3 for Designers has gone to the printer for a second print run.  Cool!  The publisher approached Tom and me for corrections, so the new batch should have the current handful of issues resolved.  Of course, copies from the first print are still in stores, so we’ll continue to leave up the Corrections page.  Response has been great on Amazon so far — thanks, reviewers!

Video cue points can be used for all sorts of things in Flash.  Typical uses involve triggering other activity, such as peripheral movie clips whose animations enhance the video content, or triggering text, such as closed captions.  I’ve seen some developers in the Adobe forums even use a cue point to signal that a video clip has reached its end.  Strictly speaking, cue points aren’t needed for that last goal (see “How to Determine the Completion of a Flash Video (FLV) File”), but it’s certainly a possible way to go.

If you’re interested in cue points yourself, but don’t know where to begin, let’s dive in.  Keep reading »

Last year around this time, I described how to pass variables into a SWF by way of something called FlashVars.  This was discussed in “How to Tell a SWF What File(s) to Load — From the Outside” which works for pretty much any sort of simple data you may want to pass in, as long as you’re talking about relatively small groups of name/value pairs.  Complex data is more likely to be suited to XML.  In that earlier blog entry, the purpose was to re-use a single SWF numerous times to load a variety of MP3 files, by specifying which audio in the HTML.  Pretty flexible solution!  You could use the same technique for loading JPGs or FLVs, to populate dynamic text fields, or whatever you like.  The article has been fairly popular and continues to be useful — as long as your SWF is published for ActionScript 2.0 (or even 1.0 if you drop the post colon suffixes — :String, :Number, and the like).  In ActionScript 3.0, things are different.  Keep reading »

Satori Canton, of Satori Interactive and part of the ActionScript.com crew, recently wrote a wonderfully supportive review of Foundation Flash CS3 for Designers, in which he describes Tom’s and my book as “required reading for anyone considering getting into Flash development,” and a “Rosetta Stone” in guiding newcomers through the often overwhelming sense of where to begin.  This is rewarding praise from someone like Satori, who’s been playing with Flash since the early days (thanks, man!).

My aim in the Adobe forums, here on this blog, and in my other writing outlets, is to be as helpful and encouraging as I can.  I remember what it was like being new to Flash, and it always meant a lot to me when someone took the time to go into detail when replying to my questions.  I’m always pleased to hear when my own writing returns the favor.