Importing motion SWF Text 1.0 files to VS10

kaddun · Post by **kaddun** » Fri Jul 07, 2006 10:55 am

Hello
Can anyone help pls? I'm wanting to make my own opening animation sequences. Have just bought this program Swf Text 1.0 and it works fine, but I can't get the file to play once I've imported it into VS10. It comes up in the library, shows up on the preview screen but is plays very fast for only a nano second. When I put it in the timeline, you can barely see it, it's that skinny. In the animation program its set at 12 fps (I've tried faster and slower speeds and it doesn't change anything once in VS10) and this works great. Play it back thru flash and its fine. It just won't play in VS10. Does anyone know if this can work or am I on the wrong track?
Please help.
thanks
Kaddun[/b]

Post by **Ron P.** » Fri Jul 07, 2006 12:25 pm

Kaddun,

How many Frames are in your SWF? If you are wanting a 3 second clip then at 12fps, you should have 36 frames. I'm not familar with Ant's Swf Text. Does it use sprites or movie clips in creating your swf? A sprite or movie clip is a container within the swf file, that has its own timeline. With Swishmax, if a sprite is used and the total frames is not reflected on the main timeline then the swf will not play correctly in VS.

When I create swfs to be used in VS, I try to keep the frame rate and the size similar to making a video, except in the case of using a banner size. Then it of course goes on an overlay track.

Ron P.

kaddun · Post by **kaddun** » Mon Jul 10, 2006 9:05 am

Hi Ron
Thanks for your reply. Sorry to take so long to answer, I was away.
I just tried your suggestion of 36 fps, but that still doesn't work in this program. Once imported into VS10 in the preview screen, press play and I get 1 sec (if that) of play. It doesn't show thru the clip, it just stops.
In SwfText I can only choose the movie length, width and fps. That's all the variable there is and I've tried to play with that to no avail. I've gone thru the help menus etc looking for any and all settings that I can change, and there doesn't seem to be any. I'm not sure what you mean by sprites or movie clips, but there is no timeline that comes up. It seems to be just a template machine, you pick a background, text, colour, what type of animation all from boxes and it changes your preview everytime you click on something, then you save it as a local file and then "publish" it to a flash file (swf). It does look very basic, but it looks like it will make what I want, IF I can only get it to import or open in VS10. (this would be much easier than the steep learning curve to master flash, when I only what to make such little things).
And to ask a dumb question, what size and frame rate do you use when making video?
thanks for your help
Kaddun

Post by **Ron P.** » Mon Jul 10, 2006 12:22 pm

Hi Kaddun,

I downloaded the trial version of SwfText, and had a quick look. So far I haven't found a way for VS to use the swfs created by that program. You might be interested in a flash authoring app that is not as expensive and does not have as steep a learning curve as Adobe's. SwishMax gives you a 15 day free trial, you might d/l it and see if it will do what you need it to do. I use it, and the SWFs created with it does import into VS and MSP.

Not a dumb question at all...

The size depends on your intended goal, either web, DVD, PDA, PocketPC, etc..

For DVDs in your area they should be PAL, 720 x 576, 25 fps.

Ron P.

kaddun · Post by **kaddun** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:08 am

Ron
Thanks again for your help. I will d/l a trial of swishmax and give it a go. It's good to know that at least you use and it does work and import into VS. Maybe I'll finally be on the right track!

Kaddun