Quark Interactive Designer
Page 4

Exercise 3: Preview the Animation

Now that we have set our actions for these objects on the page, let's save the file to the desktop. Once the file is saved, we should preview our work. There are lots of ways to do this, but the easiest is to click the preview SWF button at the bottom of the project window. See figure 7.

Figure 7 This is the Preview SWF button. Click it to preview your work.

Once the SWF file is generated, the Flash player will open and display your animation. Try clicking on the magenta and cyan boxes to see them slide across the page. To close out of the animation, quit the Flash player.

There are other ways to preview your animation. To preview just the current page of the animation, go to layout > preview swf > preview page. To preview the entire layout, go to layout > preview swf > preview layout.

Exercise 4: Animation on a Path

This is a fun one and relatively easy. We are going to define a path by using the Bézier line tool to draw a random path. Then we'll make an object follow that path at a certain speed. Review the steps and screen shots carefully. If you make a mistake, you can easily change the setting to the one you need.

Using the file you started in the last set of exercises, select the Bézier line tool (shown selected in the graphic to the right) in the tools palette from the line fly-out menu.

Use the Bézier Tool to draw a random, freeform path all over the page.
See figure 8.

Figure 8 Draw a random, free-form path all over the page.

Set the object properties as shown in figure 9. Object Name: I named mine ThePath. Object Type: Basic. (It isn't anything special; it's just a path.) Options: Choose initially hidden. We want to make something happen on this path, but the path itself shouldn't be seen. Initially at: Home. That means start it where it is right now.

Figure 9 Set up the new path.

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