Week 6 - Cancelled

Class cancelled

Week 5 - MovieClips

Step 1: Create your movieClips

1. Create a New Movie Clip Symbol and call it "carStill"
• Whilst in "carStill" state, draw a car (side on view) without wheels
2. Create a new MovieClip symbol and call it "wheelStill"
• Whilst in "wheelStill" state, draw a wheel with spokes (or any detail to show rotation)
3. Open "carStill" state and place "wheelStill" wheels from your Library on to your car (you may need to resize using the free transform tool)
4. Duplicate "carStill" in your library and call it "carMove"
5. Duplicate "wheelStill" in your library and call it "wheelMove"
6. Open "wheelMove" state and create a motion tween for the wheel.  Rotate the wheel once clockwise over 24 frames.
7. Open "carMove" state and view the properties panel
• Select the wheels on the stage and choose "Swap ..." in the properties panel.  Replace the wheels with "wheelMove"

You now have two cars in your library.  One with wheels that turn and one with wheels that don't turn.  Place an instance of each car on the stage and Test Preview your animation to make sure you have one with spinning wheels and one with stationary wheels.

Step 2: Animate car and Swap Symbols

• Motion Tween "carMove" - driving into the center of the stage and stopping, then driving off the stage. 

•  Use 3 separate motion tweens
• drive in
• stopped (this can be static - ie. not tweened if you wish)
• drive off
•  To create a new motion tween on the same layer
• create a blank keyframe after the 'drive in' motion tween
• copy the last frame of the 'drive in' motion tween
• paste the frame on to the blank keyframe
• repeat for 'drive out' motion tween
•  Your timeline should look like this (click to enlarge):

• Select the untweened Keyframe (grey colour)
• Select the car on the stage.  The properties panel should display that it is an instance of "carMove".  Swap "carMove" with "carStill"
• Test your animation scene

Step 3: Finishing Touches

• Apply motion easing to tweens to give the appearance of braking and acceleration
• Draw a traffic light
• Draw each light in an off position
• Keyframe 3 different light states (red, orange, green) and change one light to on for each frame
• Move keyframes to appropriate position on your timeline (eg car is stopped during red light)
• Draw background imagery
• Finished early? Why not try some exhaust fumes

Advanced Class - TIME CHANGE

Advanced Class - Wed Night Animation class has been extended by 30min for the rest of the term.  Class is now 5:15 - 7:45pm (Advanced class only).

Beginner Class is still 5:45 - 7:45pm.

Week 4 - Motion Easing

1. Draw a car (side on view)
• Use reference to draw your car (eg Google Images)
2. Animate car driving into the center of the stage and stopping, then driving off the stage
•  Use 3 separate motion tweens
• drive in
• stopped (this can be static - ie. not tweened if you wish)
• drive off
•  To create a new motion tween on the same layer
• create a blank keyframe after the 'drive in' motion tween
• copy the last frame of the 'drive in' motion tween
• paste the frame on to the blank keyframe
• repeat for 'drive out' motion tween
3. Apply motion easing to give the appearance of braking and acceleration
4. Draw a traffic light
• Draw each light in an on and off position (so you can animate it on and off)
• Place each light on a separate layer
• Draw background imagery

Moodle Update

Your first assessment event has just been uploaded to Moodle:

• Animate a Vehicle  (CUFANM301A: Create 2D digital animations) - Due 31st Aug

Week 3 - Drawing in Flash, Motion Paths

Exercise #1

1. Create a motion tween
2. Create a shape tween

Exercise #2

• Draw an aerial view of a motor vehicle
• Use reference material - copy this image
  
• Paste it on a separate layer in Flash and lock the layer to prevent editing

• Motion Tween the vehicle

• Draw a road for the vehicle to drive on (on a seperate layer)

• Draw a path for the road
• Increase the width of the stroke to be as thick as a road.
• Change path colour to black

• Copy and paste the road (use Paste in Place)

• Change the colour to white
• Change the width to suit a line-marking width
• Change the stroke pattern to be 'Dashed'

•  Copy and paste your dashed line (use Paste in Place)
• Change the colour to pink (so it's easy to see)
• Change the stroke pattern to be solid
• Select the path and Cut it
• Select the motion tween of the vehicle in the timeline
• Paste the copied path

• If necessary, reposition the motion guide so that the car now follows the road

•  Press Control and Enter to preview your animation!

• Practice drawing in flash by adding more objects to your aerial scene

Resources:

Week 2 - Animation Revision & Sunset Scene

Exercise #1 - Revision Test

• Create a motion tween
• Create a shape tween

Demonstration: Creating and Editing motion tweens

Discussion: Differences between a motion and shape tween.

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Demonstration:

• Layers
• Color Effects (changing Tint and Alpha transparency)

Exercise #2 - Use a combination of shape and motion tweens to create a sunset scene. Your scene should include at least the following elements:

• sky
• grass
• sun
• a tree

Note: all objects should be on a separate layer


Exercise #3 - Add stars to your sunset scene using the polystar tool, grouping and adjusting the Alpha level


Save your work.