Does all the Animation and Graphics Need to Be Flash?
Hi, I am reading the manual and it appears that I can use either .swf or .jpeg graphic files (please correct me if I am wrong). But on the forum here I keep seeing references to Flash animation, so I am a little confused, sorry to be such a knucklehead. Do I have to utlize a flash drawing tool to use Lassie? Or can I just use .jpeg files for my graphics for use in the background and creating my sprites. Also can anyone recommend a flash animation or drawing program? Preferably freeware (if exists) or reasonably priced. Thanks, Preston

ermph... yeah. I can see where this would get confusing with all the different threads of discussion going on about various (unrelated) topics. So, here's the full rundown, I'll try to make it as straight forward as possible: :arrow: First: SWF animation. This IS flash animation. When Flash publishes a final, usable, playable animation it complies the native project file (.fla) into a SWF movie file. In short when you see SWF, think Flash. :arrow: Next: LassieAS (the upcoming Flash engine) *will be* limited to only loading in SWF and JPG files. However, no build of this engine has yet been released so this is a moot point to current LASSIE development. All discussion revolving around LassieAS is just chatter and has no immediate relevance. :arrow: Finally: LASSIE (the current engine built in Director, available on the website) has very few media restrictions because, basically, Director is a multimedia powerhouse. In the engine currently available the primary image formats are BMP, JPG, GIF, and SWF. BMPs work best for static graphics (no compression issues. JPGs tend to break up). As for animation, SWFs or animated GIFs both work. For engine-controlled animations (such as the character sprite) SWFs are required so that Director can interface with the embeded animation states within the SWF movie. For any SWF animations required by the engine (again, the character), you will find extensive documentation on their formatting and sample Flash files on the website. If it's just a decorative room animation, though, animated GIF will work fine.

Also, SWF files don't have to be animations. You can save a static image as a SWF file. Programs such as Illustrator can export images as SWF files. I'm not aware of any free software that can animate SWFs or save single images as SWFs, but I'm sure they've got to exist. And I know Quicktime can export to FLV (Flash video), but I don't know if that really helps or if LassieAS will be able to use FLVs.

Good question on FLV's. Honestly, I don't fully understand them yet. We've been using them for a massive project at work, although we've just been embedding them into SWF files. I would assume that Flash has some method of streaming them in, but it's something I'll have to research... I may have a work project coming up that will force me to figure them out. If that's the case, I'll know soon :D

Thanks so much for the clarification and info...that is really helpful.

I'm not aware of any free software that can animate SWFs or save single images as SWFs, but I'm sure they've got to exist. Open Office has some form of SWF export, although I've never used it, so I don't know what it can do. http://www.openoffice.org/