How to Make a Flash Animation

You can make flash animations as simple as a ball bouncing across the screen and as complicated as a timed, multi-layer animation of a dancing flock of geese moving all at once. You don't have to be a flash guru to make your own simple flash animations.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

1. Open a new project in Flash. Decide on the size of your animation. The area where your animation will take place is called the stage. Decide on the specific animation you'd like to make before you begin.
2. Draw or import your image. Using a paint or pencil tool in the tool bar, draw out the image you want. For each new color you draw with, create a new layer by going to Insert, Timeline, and New Layer. This gives you the ability to edit each layer individually instead of having to redraw your entire image once you've made a change or erased too much. There is also the option of importing an image, which you can do by going to File, Import, Image into library/stage.
3. Create a symbol. In order to create an animation you need to create a symbol which you do by selecting all the layers in the timeline located at the top of your screen and right clicking on the images. Select "Convert to Symbol." This makes it so that you can animate all the pieces of your image at once. This creates a subsection under your main "Scene." In order to access the parts of this, double click on the blue outlined image.
4. Name your symbol. When your symbol has been created, go to the properties bar at the bottom of your workspace and click on the first drop down option while you have your symbol selected. Select "Movie Clip" as the type of symbol and name it in a way that is easily identifiable in the blank "Instance Name" box right below it.
5. Animate your image. For each symbol you have created, create a layer in the main stage. Keep in mind that you do not want multiple images in a symbol or multiple symbols on a layer, because it means that every time you animate in your main scene you will animate the entire contents. There will be a keyframe for each layer in the timeline for each symbol you already have. Create a new keyframe by selecting F6 or going to Insert, Timeline, Keyframe. In your second keyframe, move your symbol to another area.
6. Click F5 or go to Insert, Timeline, Frame to add frames that contain the same information as the keyframe you have just selected. Each frame represents an amount of time. If you were to insert 24 frames between keyframes, your animation would take 2 seconds. Add more, and your animation will take longer.
7. Add animation. Click on one of the regular frames between one of your two keyframes. At the bottom, a box will show up in the properties bar that will give you animation states. Select Motion in the Tween drop down menu, which will highlight the space between your two keyframes in the timeline. Then draw a straight line between the two keyframes.
8. Export your slide show. Press Ctrl, Enter or File, Export to view your exported file. This creates a "swf" file and then you can upload it right to the Internet.

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