ptg
Animating with Motion
Tweening
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What You’ll Do
Understand Motion Tweening
Apply Motion Tween Presets
Create a Motion Tween
Adjust Motion Tween Properties
Edit Motion Tween Properties with
the Motion Editor
Add Color Effects and Filters
Work with Property Keyframes
Edit the Path of a Motion Tween
Copy Motion as ActionScript
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Introduction
In Flash, it’s not necessary to draw every frame of an anima-
tion. You can set the position and attributes of your art in the
beginning and ending frames, and Flash will create all of the
frames in between. This is called
tweening
. A motion tween
connects two keyframes, each with different effects or charac-
teristics applied to them and then gradually "morphs" one
into the other. Tweening allows you to quickly animate
objects, apply fades, and gradually alter color, alpha, scale,
and any other effect that can be applied to a symbol, group,
or text object.
The span between the starting frame and ending frame of

on the Stage. Its parent (original) symbol in
the Library is not affected. Motion tweening
produces the smallest file sizes of any of
Flash's animation methods.
Flash use two different types of motion
tweens:
classic tween
and
motion tween
. A
classic tween uses several instances in
keyframes of an object along with property
keyframes to create a tween, while a motion
tween uses one object instance over the entire
span along with property keyframes to create
a tween. A property keyframe is a frame
within the motion tween where you define a
value for a property. A motion tween is known
as object based animation. Motion tweens are
easy to create and provide precise control,
while classic tweens are more complex to cre-
ate and provide more advanced control. All
motion tweens from Flash CS3 are classic
tweens.
Tween Differences
There are several differences between classic
and motion tweens.
Classic Tweens
◆
Use Keyframes and property keyframes

tweens.
◆
Don’t allow frame scripts.
◆
Allow text as a tweenable type. It doesn’t
convert it to a symbol.
◆
Treat tween sp ans as a sing le obje ct that
you can stretch and resize in the
Timeline.
◆
Apply eases across the entire length of a
motion tween span.
◆
Apply only one color effect per tween.
◆
Allow animation of 3D objects.
◆
Don’t allow symbol swaps and setting
the frame number of a graphic symbol to
display in a property keyframe.
◆
Convert all non-allowed object types
(editable shapes and groups) to a movie
clip symbol.
From the Library of Wow! eBook
ptg
Chapter 8 Animating with Motion Tweening
239
Motion tweening when viewed in

A preview of the preset plays in
the Preview pane at the top of the
Motion Presets panel.
◆
To stop the preview, click
outside the Motion Presets
panel.
Click Apply.
◆
If you apply a motion tween to
a non-tweenable object, a
dialog box appears, asking you
to convert it to a symbol.
The motion is set to start at the
current position of the object on
the Stage.
◆
To apply the preset so that the
motion ends at the current
position of the object on the
Stage, hold down Shift, and
then click Apply.
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name in the Motion Presets
folder.
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Did You Know?
You can import and export a motion
preset.
To import a motion preset, click
the Options button on the Motion
Presets panel, click Import, select the
XML file, and then click Open. To
export a motion preset, select the pre-
set in the Motion Presets panel, click
the Options button, click Export, spec-
ify a name and location, and then click
Save.
You can delete a motion preset.
Select
the motion preset in the Motion
Presets panel that you want to delete,
and then click the Remove Item button.
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From the Library of Wow! eBook