How to Clone in CS3

In science fiction, cloning can mean replicating a human -- or an animal -- with a few chemicals in a Petri dish. On the computer, cloning isn't too far from that process, though no chemicals are required. Cloning in the Adobe Creative Suite version 3 collection of programs takes on more of a duplication or copying effect. Use cloning in Photoshop to duplicate a person -- much like those scientists do -- and in Flash to duplicate an entire scene instead of recoding it. Clone in Dreamweaver to replicate objects on your website without having to re-add them and risk uploading or entry errors.

Instructions

Clone With Photoshop

1. Open Photoshop CS3 and click "File." Select "Open" and browse to an image to clone. Double-click the file name.

2. Click the "Lasso" tool, third from the top of the "Tools" pane. Draw an outline around just the part of the picture to clone, such as a person.

3. Right-click inside the blinking dotted lines and select "Layer via Copy." Nothing will really seem to change in the picture.

4. Click the "Move" tool, the top icon on the "Tools" pane. Drag the cursor to the left or right to drag the clone into place on the picture.

Clone With Flash

1. Open Flash CS3 and click the "Open" option on the left of the splash screen. Navigate to the Flash file to clone and double-click the FLA extension.

2. Drag the timeline indicator to the beginning keyframe of the scene to clone, which will be indicated by a solid black circle in the keyframe.

3. Click once on the keyframe. Press and hold down the "Shift" key. Click the last keyframe in the scene, also indicated by a circle and shading between the two beginning and ending keyframes. The entire scene will be highlighted in black.

4. Right-click the highlight and select "Copy Frames." Click off the highlight. Right-click another empty keyframe. Select "Paste Keyframes." The scene will be pasted in, a clone of the first.

Clone With Dreamweaver

1. Open Dreamweaver CS3 and click the "Open" option on the left of the splash screen. Navigate to the Web file with an object to clone and double-click the file name.

2. Click the "Files" pane on the right side of the screen. If the small drop-down arrow isn't pointing down, click it to open the list of all the files in the Dreamweaver site.

3. Click one of the objects in the list, such as a JPG. Drag and drop it on the Dreamweaver page.

4. Repeat the process to drag and drop another instance of the file onto the website. This is ideal when you are building catalogs of items or rows of clickable buttons on an interactive site.

References

• University of Washington: Selections
• Sacramento State University: Introduction to Adobe Flash CS3
• The University of Arizona: Learning Dreamweaver CS3