Macromedia MAX 2005 - Anaheim, CA What’s New In Flash 8
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Animating Filters
You can animate filters in the Timeline. Objects on separate keyframes joined by a tween have
the parameters for corresponding filters tweened on intermediate frames. If a filter does not have a
matching filter (a filter of the same type) at the opposite end of the tween, a matching filter is added
automatically to ensure that the effect is at the end of the animation sequence.
Flash does the following to prevent motion tweens from functioning incorrectly in the event of a
missing filter at one end of the tween, or filters applied in a different order at each end:
• If you apply a motion tween to a movie clip that has filters applied to it, when you insert a
keyframe at the opposite end of the tween, the movie clip automatically has the same filters,
with the same stacking order, on the last frame of the tween as it did at the beginning of the
tween.
• If you place movie clips on two different frames with different filters applied to each, and you
apply a motion tween between the frames, Flash first processes the movie clip with the most
filters. Flash then compares the filters applied to the first movie clip against those used by the
second movie clip.
If no matching filters are found in the second movie clip, Flash generates a "dummy" filter
with no parameters and the color of the existing filters.
• If a motion tween exists between two keyframes:
o If you add a filter to the object in one keyframe, Flash automatically adds a dummy
filter to the movie clip when it reaches the keyframe at the other end of the tween.
o If you remove a filter from an object in one keyframe, Flash automatically removes the
matching filter from the movie clip when it reaches the keyframe at the other end of
the tween.
• If you set filter parameters inconsistently between the beginning and end of a motion tween,
Flash applies the filter settings of the starting frame to the interpolated frames. Inconsistent
settings occur when the following parameters are set differently between the beginning and
end of the tween: knockout, inner shadow, inner glow, and type of gradient glow and gradient
bevel.
For example, if you create a motion tween using the drop shadow filter, and apply a drop
shadow with a knockout on the first frame of the tween, and an inner shadow on the last
frame of the tween, Flash corrects the inconsistent use of the filter in the motion tween. In
this case, Flash applies the filter settings used on the first frame of the tween--a drop shadow
with a knockout.
Filters and Flash Player performance
The type, number, and quality of filters you apply to objects can affect the performance of SWF files
as you play them. The more filters you apply to an object, the greater the number of calculations
Macromedia Flash Player must process to correctly display the visual effects you've created. For this
reason, Macromedia recommends that you apply only a limited number of filters to a given object.
