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In this step you will edit the .FLA
file to customize text symbols. You will play movie in Flash
editor step-by-step to find occurrences of symbols that you need
changed, select these symbols, switch to symbol editing mode, enter
your text, and switch back to movie editing mode to observe the
results of changes you made. The substeps give more detailed
explanation to this:
1. Open the .FLA file from your
downloaded Sample Flash Intro directory.
2. Make sure the timeline is
visible and the movie is rewound to start (pink square in the
timeline ruler highlights frame 1). You can rewind the movie
by selecting Control>Rewind. Adjust zooming by using
View>Magnification.
3. Play movie step-by-step by using
Control>Step Forward or typing '.' (a dot). Search the scene for
text that needs to be changed.
4. When found the text you wish to
change switch to Arrow
tool (use Window>Tools to display and hide Toolbox).
5. Make sure the needed text symbol
can be selected. Click it with Arrow
tool and proceed to step
1.8 if succeeded (if a blue box around the symbol and a black cross
over it display). Else go to the next step.
6. Identify the layer to which the
text symbol belongs trying to make layers transparent or displaying
contents in contours. When found the needed layer select
keyframe in which the symbol appears for the first time. The
symbol should get selected automatically. If one keyframe does
not work try successive keyframes - it does not matter from which
keyframe you start editing symbol. If succeeded go to step 1.8, else
go to the next step.
7. Display Library Window by
selecting Window>Library and find the text you need by scrolling
through all symbols in the movie.
8. If you were able to select the
symbol with a click go to symbol editing mode by right-clicking it
and selecting Edit. If you located the symbol in Library
double-click on symbol icon.
9. When in symbol editing mode
select Text tool and click
on scene to create a single-line autosize textbox. Type and
highlight text, make sure the Character tab displays (if not, select
Window>Panels>Character) and match text appearance as good as you
can using options provided in the character formatting tab.
10. When finished formatting text
switch to Arrow tool and
select the text block. Select Modify>Break Apart to transform
text into curves. This makes it impossible to edit text in
future but playback becomes more robust on various systems.
11. Finally, delete the initial
text block and drag the one you created in its place. Return
to movie editing mode by selecting Edit>Movie.
Note that, though infrequently,
symbols themselves happen to be animated movies with their own
layers, keyframes, tweening, and embedded symbols. You can freely
apply the above described movie editing procedures (1.2..1.8) to
animated symbols. |