Macromedia Flash Shading Tutorial
Flash offers some very powerful drawing tools that allow artists and non-artists alike to create animated buttons, drawings, animations, or even full websites using a set of graphic tools. One of the most versatile and useful features in Adobe Flash for artists is the ability to shade objects in a variety of ways using the color palette and Flash's gradient tool. Combined with filters, these tools are capable of producing some spectacular effects in Flash.
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Instructions
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Create an Object on the Stage
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On the drawing toolbar, click and hold the "Rectangle Tool" button until a fly-out menu appears and then choose the "Oval Tool."
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In the "Properties Inspector" for Flash, choose black as your stroke color by clicking on the colored square beneath the pencil icon. Choose red as your fill color by clicking on the colored square beneath the paint bucket icon.
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Move your cursor to the center of the stage and left-click and hold the mouse button as you drag out a ball of any size. Release when you are satisfied with its shape and size.
Change the Shading of your Object
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Left-click anywhere in the fill area of your ball to select the red fill, then open your color window by left-clicking its icon on the toolbar.
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For "Type" choose "Radial". When you select this, Flash may change the color of your fill to black and white. That's fine. Towards the bottom of the color chooser window you will see a long, thin rectangular bar above a fat rectangular bar with the two primary colors (probably black and white) blending together in the middle of them. On the left side of the small, thin rectangle is a small black square. Click on it.
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In the color chooser that opens up after you click on the black square, pick the color red. You can close this color chooser by left-clicking anywhere away from the window. Then left click on the small white square opposite the red one you just worked with. Choose black from this color picker that opens up.
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Now you have a ball with red in the middle and black around the edges. To adjust the gradient shading of this object, make sure the fill is selected on the ball (left-click on it), then on the drawing toolbar, click and hold your mouse on the "Free Transform" tool until a fly-out menu opens showing the Gradient Tool. Select it.
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The control handles for changing the gradient of your selected object appear on the ball. Click the dot in the center and move it to the upper-left corner of the ball, and you will create a nice lighting effect with the red gradient fading to black. You can also adjust the width and angle of the fill by dragging the handles around the edges of the fill circle.
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Tips & Warnings
You can use the linear fill to create shading effects in rectangles and squares.
Make sure your fill is selected before choosing your colors in the color window or else nothing will happen.
References
Resources
- Photo Credit border/business graphic -4 color graphic with copyspace image by Andrew Brown from Fotolia.com
