[awesty]

[h1]Guide Layers[/h1]

Motion tweeing is all good when you want the object to move in a straight line.  But what happens when you want it to move round in a circle or something.  That would be very time consuming and take alot of keyframes and the final result wouldnt look very good either.  But thats where Guide Layers come in.

1. First of all open a new flash document and make the Frame rate 24fps.  On the first layer draw a ball and make it a movie clip named ball.
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2. Make a new layer and name it Guide.  On that layer draw a cirlce with no fill so it takes up nearly the whole stage and cut out a gap in it.
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3. Now make that layer (the one you named guide) a Guide Layer by right clicking on the layer and selecting guide.
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4. Make the layer with the movie clip ball a Guided layer by double clicking the page curl icon and selecting Guided.
NOTE: This Layer must be underneath the Guide Layer to work
NOTE: Flash might have automatically made this layer Guided
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5. Now drag the ball so it is at the start of the circle.
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6. Make a new keyframe (F6) on the ball layer on frame 25.  Do the same for the Guide layer but dont make a keyframe, on a frame (F5).
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7. Now just click on the key frame on frame 25 and move the ball to the end of the circle.  Then just create a motion tween on the ball layer between the first keyframe and the last.
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The result should look like this:
<a href="http://www.imageaddicts.net/uploads/guide_layer_tut.swf" target="_blank">http://www.imageaddicts.net/uploads/guide_layer_tut.swf</a>

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Click the link below to download the Flash files for this tutorial.
Guide Layers FLA

[Blaze]

neato im assuming this works with different shapes as well?

[awesty]

yeah it works with all shapes. i forgot to mention that you cant actually see the guide layer when you play the movie. and SKETCHi, where do i post the 40x40?

[SKETCHi]

Just post it in the topic or in a reply if you want to use one. If not, I will use the default flash one.

[awesty]

yea the default flash one will be fine

[Starchild]

nice simple tut man, nice1

[awesty]

thanks, theres not many tuts about guide layers so i thought id do one

[ssjskipp]

Nice Tut awesty, =]

[juanmiguel]

awesty are you with action scripting? can you the chess board?

[awesty]

i spose i could if i put some time and effort into it, but im not really into chess and id rather learn scripting for something that i would enjoy. ssj probably would already know how, he is 100 times better than me at action scripting 

[juanmiguel]

ah okay! can you do a tut for me like the fire effects in your photo... like to do it here with my project presentation in the office...can you do that for me?

[awesty]

ill try to do one sometime. its just some frame by framing. mine isnt really that good if yo have a look at some flash movies and have a look at some explosions

[Blitz]

hmm the pics dont seem to be working for me... do you mean onion skinning?

[awesty]

okay i re-uploaded the result. i didnt mean onion skinning, i meant guide layering. they are completly different

[Blitz]

oh yer can see it now...yer good tut m8