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USING FLASH CS4 PROFESSIONAL
Symbols, instances, and library assets
2
In the Property inspector, select one of the following options from the Style menu in the Color Effect section:
Brightness
Adjusts the relative lightness or darkness of the image, measured on a scale from black (–100%) to white
(100%). To adjust brightness, click the triangle and drag the slider or enter a value in the box.
Tint
Colors the instance with the same hue. To set the tint percentage from transparent (0%) to completely saturated
(100%), use the Tint slider in the Property inspector. To adjust tint, click the triangle and drag the slider or enter a
value in the box. To select a color, enter red, green, and blue values in the respective boxes, or click the Color control
and select a color from the Color Picker.
Alpha
Adjusts the transparency of the instance, from transparent (0%) to completely saturated (100%). To adjust the
alpha value, click the triangle and drag the slider or enter a value in the box.
Advanced
Separately adjusts the red, green, blue, and transparency values of an instance. This is most useful to create
and animate subtle color effects on objects such as bitmaps. The controls on the left let you reduce the color or
transparency values by a specified percentage. The controls on the right let you reduce or increase the color or
transparency values by a constant value.
The current red, green, blue, and alpha values are multiplied by the percentage values, and then added to the constant
values in the right column, producing the new color values. For example, if the current red value is 100, setting the left
slider to 50% and the right slider to 100% produces a new red value of 150 ([100 x .5] + 100 = 150).
Note:
The Advanced settings in the Effect panel implement the function (a * y+ b)= x where a is the percentage specified
in the left set of boxes, y is the color of the original bitmap, b is the value specified in the right set of boxes, and x is the
resulting effect (between 0 and 255 for RGB, and 0 and 100 for alpha transparency).
You can also change the color of an instance using the ActionScript ColorTransform object. For detailed information
on the Color object, see ColorTransform in
ActionScript 2.0 Language Reference
or
ActionScript 3.0 Language and
Components Reference
.
See also
“
Add a classic tween to instances, groups, or type
” on page 212
Swap one instance for another
To display a different instance on the Stage and preserve all the original instance properties, such as color effects or
button actions, assign a different symbol to an instance.
For example, suppose you’re creating a cartoon with a rat symbol for your character, but decide to change the character
to a cat. You could replace the rat symbol with the cat symbol and have the updated character appear in roughly the
same location in all your frames.
See also
“
Working with button symbols
” on page 164
Assign a different symbol to an instance
1
Select the instance on the Stage, and select Window
> Properties.
2
Click the Swap button in the Property inspector.
3
Select a symbol to replace the symbol currently assigned to the instance. To duplicate a selected symbol, click
Duplicate Symbol and click OK.
Duplicating lets you base a new symbol on an existing one in the library and minimizes copying if you’re making
several symbols that differ slightly.
Updated 5 March 2009
