Director Single Frame Animations
You've probably created animations in Director by laying out graphics in the score and then letting the playback
head move from frame to frame creating animation. This works fine for animations that can be the same thing everytime,
but if you find yourself needing to create dynamic animations at runtime, you'll probably want to learn about single-frame
animations. The idea is to make the playback head "spin" on a single frame and then control things dynamically with
Lingo. If you have something to contribute [or contest], please post your ideas to
the forums.
Check out the very ninja-like source movie with this example to get an even closer look at single frame animations.
Good luck!
Download the FREE Director source movie here! [Director 8.0,
188Kb]
To make the playback head stay on one frame, create a frame script with a "go to the frame" line like the
following:
on exitFrame
global gAnimationObject
gAnimationObject.AdvanceAnimFrame()
go to the frame
end
To help manage the task of animating on a single frame, I created an animation object which allows me to specify
each "snapshot" of animation and play it back as I wish. The object looks like this:
property myMemberList, myLocList, mySpriteList
on new me
me.myMemberList = []
me.myLocList = []
me.mySpriteList = []
return me
end
on AddAnimFrame me, aMember, aLoc, aSprite
set anError = 0
--check for valid member
if (aMember.number ‹= 0) then
set anError = -1
end if
--check for a point object
if (aLoc.objectP = FALSE) then
set anError = -2
end if
--check for an integer greater than 0
if (aSprite ‹= 0) or (aSprite.integerP = FALSE) then
set anError = -2
end if
--store frame of animation in object
if (anError = 0) then
me.myMemberList.add(aMember)
me.myLocList.add(aLoc)
me.mySpriteList.add(aSprite)
end if
--return error code
return anError
end
on AdvanceAnimFrame me
set anError = 0
--if there is nothing to advance, set the error code, otherwise advance the animation frame
if (me.myMemberList.count = 0) then
set anError = -1
else
if the member of sprite me.mySpriteList.getAt(1) <> me.myMemberList.getAt(1) then
set the member of sprite me.mySpriteList.getAt(1) = me.myMemberList.getAt(1)
end if
set the loc of sprite me.mySpriteList.getAt(1) = me.myLocList.getAt(1)
updatestage
me.mySpriteList.deleteAt(1)
me.myMemberList.deleteAt(1)
me.myLocList.deleteAt(1)
end if
--return error code
return anError
end
on ClearAll me
me.myMemberList = []
me.myLocList = []
me.mySpriteList = []
return 0
end
on GetSize me
return me.myMemberList.count
end
So, to add to my animation, I simply provide my animation object with a series of members, locs, and sprite numbers.
They are stored in the object and then I can advance my animation as I wish. Check out the source
movie to get a closer look with a couple example animations. The source file is for Director 8.0.
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