Animation options besides Flash? [Archive]

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CallMeZoot

03-12-2006, 09:03 AM

Hi,

I have a Flash website (designed in Swish) because I wanted a lot of animated elements (click on a link, and the new text slides in, fades out, etc.).

But now the flash site is getting kind of bloated and cumbersome, and I find it a pain to update content regularly. I would like to re-code most of the website in XHTML (or something else) so that it's a bit easier to deal with, but I don't want to lose some of the flashier elements (pun intended).

I figure I can embed an animated flash menu, and have the rest of the site in HTML, but is there a way to animate elements in the non-flash part of the site? I'm not looking for lots of crazy effects here, just a fade-in here, a slide-in there, etc.

Any tips? I'm not a newbie but I'm mainly self-taught so chances are I've missed some major steps along the way... I'm in the process of learning more about XHTML and CSS -- right now I know very little about Java, XML, php, etc. but if these are the keys to getting what I want, then I will learn them.

Thanks,
chris.

masterofstuff

03-12-2006, 10:08 AM

CallMeZoot

03-12-2006, 10:20 AM

If all you want the flash for is links, you can save a small flash as a gif and put text in the button you make in flash and save it as a gif and put it on your site. just put an href around it.

ex:
<a href="page.html"><img src="home_button.gif"></a>
Here, I'm assuming you know how to get rid of the blue border that comes along with links, because, I don't feel like typing out CSS.

Tell me if this helps you.

Yes, that is very helpful. Two quick questions:

1. Can I do this with a whole menu of buttons, instead of just individual links? If I save an animated flash menu as GIF, how do I get individual buttons in the menu to affect content in the non-flash portion of my site--can I apply image map properties to it as if it were a regular GIF?

2. Is it possible to animate the non-flash part of my site? For example, to have the main text of my site "fade in" or "slide in" without using flash? I'd like to keep the text in html if possible, but maybe there's a way to add these effects with CSS or Java (or php or XML, which I know nothing about)?

Thanks,
chris.

masterofstuff

03-12-2006, 10:23 AM

You can find out how to do image maps, I'd help you out, but I've never used image maps before. I'm pretty sure you can do it like that though.

Java applets? maybe.

masterofstuff

03-12-2006, 10:29 AM

OR you could use DHTML for a drop-down or over menu, That does require knowledge of JavaScript and CSS that I do not have. (I couldn't get one I was working on to work).

wh666-666

03-13-2006, 06:00 PM

as masterofstuff said try dhtml. you can have alot of cool effects without the need for javascript. Try this site dynamicdrive (http://www.dynamicdrive.com/). contains dhtml and javascripts and between there and javascriptsource (http://www.javascriptsource.com) you should find what you need

:D

wh666-666

03-13-2006, 06:04 PM

oh by the way callmezoot, in swish (i use it as well) do you know how to change the scene options to a percentage instead of in pixels? dont know if it can be done but if you know if there is an option in swish that would save me alot of time. Many thanks zoot

Bytes

03-13-2006, 06:58 PM

1. Can I do this with a whole menu of buttons, instead of just individual links? If I save an animated flash menu as GIF, how do I get individual buttons in the menu to affect content in the non-flash portion of my site--can I apply image map properties to it as if it were a regular GIF?

For just menu navigation buttons you may want to consider the following off-shelf software:

http://www.xara.com/products/menumaker/

Regards,