Working With Button Symbols - Adobe 38039336 - Flash CS3 Professional User Manual

Navigate to a symbol, and click OK.
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In the Symbol Properties dialog box, under Source, select Always Update Before Publishing and click OK.
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Working with button symbols

Create a button
Buttons are actually four-frame interactive movie clips. When you select the button behavior for a symbol, Flash
creates a Timeline with four frames. The first three frames display the button's three possible states; the fourth frame
defines the active area of the button. The Timeline doesn't actually play; it reacts to pointer movement and actions
by jumping to the appropriate frame.
To make a button interactive, you place an instance of the button symbol on the Stage and assign actions to the
instance. You must assign the actions to the instance of the button in the document, not to frames in the button's
Timeline.
Each frame in the Timeline of a button symbol has a specific function:
• The first frame is the Up state, representing the button whenever the pointer is not over the button.
• The second frame is the Over state, representing the button's appearance when the pointer is over the button.
• The third frame is the Down state, representing the button's appearance as it is clicked.
• The fourth frame is the Hit state, defining the area that responds to the mouse click. This area is invisible in the
SWF file.
Create a button using a movie clip symbol or a button component. Using each type of button has advantages.
Creating a button using a movie clip lets you add more frames to the button or add more complex animation.
However, movie clip buttons have a larger file size than button symbols. Using a button component allows you to
bind the button to other components, to share and display data in an application. Button components also include
prebuilt features, such as accessibility support, and can be customized. Button components include the Button,
RadioButton, and CheckBox. For more information, see Button component in ActionScript 2.0 Components
Language Reference or Using the Button in Using ActionScript 3.0 Components.
For a text tutorial about buttons, see Add Button Navigation and Animation on the Flash Tutorials page at
www.adobe.com/go/learn_fl_tutorials.
1 Select Edit > Deselect All to ensure that nothing is selected on the Stage.
Select Insert > New Symbol, or press Control+F8 (Windows) or Command+F8 (Macintosh).
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To create the button, you convert the button frames to keyframes.
3 In the Create New Symbol dialog box, enter a name for the new button symbol, and for Type select Button.
Flash switches to symbol-editing mode. The Timeline header changes to display four consecutive frames labeled Up,
Over, Down, and Hit. The first frame, Up, is a blank keyframe.
To create the Up state button image, select the Up frame in the Timeline and then use the drawing tools, import
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a graphic, or place an instance of another symbol on the Stage.
You can use a graphic or movie clip symbol in a button, but you cannot use another button in a button. Use a movie
clip symbol to animate the button.
Click the Over frame, and select Timeline > Keyframe.
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FLASH CS3 221
User Guide