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Art 444 Lecture Notes

Flash 5 Lecture Notes

Adding Sound To Your Movies (Chapter 14)

Please refer to the Digital Audio for Multimedia Projects lecture note for for steps for digitizing audio for Flash use.

  • Flash imports AIFF (Mac format), WAV (Windows format) and MP-3 files for both platforms. With Quicktime 4, both platforms can import Quicktime movies containing sounds and Sun AU files. For best results I would stay with AIFF, WAV and MP-3 files.
  • Flash has limited sound editing features. Use dedicated sound editing software such as Macromedia's SoundEdit 16 for more control in the sound editing environment.
  • Using Sounds in Flash: use the Sound panel to add sounds to movies with keyframes
  • Importing Sounds: you must first import a sound to the Library via the File> Import menu. To hear a sound, select it within the Library and click the play button at the top right of the waveform.
  • Independent Sounds vs. Synchronized Sounds: unsynchronized sounds play independently of the frames of the movie and can continue playing after the movie ends. These are referred to as event sounds and are initiated on a specific keyframe. Depending on the system, the time it takes the sound to play can vary. Synchronized sounds or streaming sounds play entire sound clips with specific frames. Flash does this by breaking the sound into smaller pieces and attaching a piece to to a specific frame.
  • Organizing Sounds in Separate Layers: it is easier to work with sounds if you locate them on their own layer.
  • Adding the Sounds to Frames: set a keyframe for your sound to initiate at. Drag the sound from the Library to either the stage or to the layer in the Timeline (my preference). Although sounds show no presence in the Stage itself, you will see a tiny waveform appear in the layer of the timeline where it was placed.
  • Adding Sounds to Buttons: audio feedback in association with a button helps to enhance the button's effect. Drag a sound onto either the Over state or Down state of a button keyframe.
  • Synching Sounds in Movies: There are 4 settings for Cinching sound in the Sound panel: Event, Start, Stop and Stream. You must use a keyframe in association with these settings.
  • Event Sounds: these sounds play in their own timeline. Flash synchronizes the beginning of an event sound with a specific keyframe and the sounds plays until the end of the sound clip or until the clip encounters an instruction to stop playing that specific or all sounds.
  • Start Sounds: these behave just like event sounds with one important difference: Flash does not play a new instance of that sound if the sound is already playing. Set the Sync to Start in looping movies to avoid multiple instances of a sound from playing over each other.
  • Streaming Sounds: streamed sounds are specifically geared for playback over the web. Set the Sync to Stream for this feature. Keep in mind that if the user's connection is slow, Flash will sacrifice some visuals in your movie to match the sound and images as closely as possible. To avoid this scenario, you can Preload a movie before it starts. See pgs. 439-442 for more info.
  • Stopping Sounds: to stop the playback of a sound, set the Sync to Stop at a specific keyframe.
    • Note: This works well when you are using a looping background sound and need to switch to a new scene that will load a new background sound to play. Otherwise, the original looping sound from the first scene will play over the one in the new scene until it has finished looping.
  • Looping Sounds: set the number loops in the Sound panel. There is no way to set a sound to infinity.
  • Editing Sounds: from the Sound panel's pop-up Effect menu you can set simple fades for your sounds. See pgs. 428-431 for more detail.

 

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