Do you use scenes? do you reverse? preload?

Posted January 8th, 2009 by
Categories: straightguysca.com

Some questions for the Flash 8 users about practices.

1. Is it better to create a preloader in a separate swf for the whole site so it preloads and at the end loads the site.swf ? How do you create a raster preloader that shows up right away - as I have seen numerous times, in my case it shows up many seconds later.

2. When you create a site, is it best to create a new scene for each button/section? and let's say each section has something animated, do you create yet another scene to leave that section to go back to hompage or is it better to have it go in reverse in that scene, then jump back to homepage?

thx !

anyone have tips/answers pls ?

I use scenes. Using lots of movieclips and setting _visible to false still takes a performance hit since they are still rendered, though invisible. It also provides better organization.

And as far as preloading goes, the more library items you have exporting to the first frame, the longer it will take for your preloader to show. Turn off export in first frame and place the on the stage manually after the first frame (but before they are used). Heres a tool to help that: http://www.saydesign.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=49

REally, when I think about it, I have never had the need to use scenes. I think that scenes would get me too confused with what is what. So I would have to say that the use of scenes would have to be just preference. It's a lot easier to manage without them (I think) because you have all of your content right in front of you, on the timeline and library. As soon as you have more than one main timeline, I tend to get a little confused with what is where. (That is why I try to avoid using a level other than _level0 . As for reversal, that can work somtimes, depending on how you want it too look. I have never used that either, but I heard it seems to work fine. As for the rasterized pre-loader, I wouldn't have a clue, I will look it up and give another reply in this thread if I find anything :huh:

Thats why I say in certain cases scenes are bad. I am simply saying that holding to the "scenes are bad" mentality spreads misconceptions and some people end up thinking (foolishly) that if you use scenes in any case you are stupid.

@jjcorreia, I think we mean external swfs and not mcs that are in the main timeline instead seperate sefs that the main swf can load and unload swfs into.

Scenes are best for animation, using flash for making films and such.
But for applications then therez no need since code is more effecient and reliable most of the time.
I usually put my preloader on a separate scene tho cuz I dont want to mix em up!

Preloading is as much art as it is science. You only need an external preloading swf if you have lots of stuff that loads on frame 1 (components are the usual culprit). Most of the time you can avoid this. A fast raster preloader depends on a lot of factors, but mostly on getting the compression as high as possible for the image.

Forget Scenes. Learn to build all your site pieces in separate movieClips. That way you can just show and hide them as needed. You can do all your animation with either the MM Tween Class or Fuse Kit http://www.mosessupposes.com/Fuse/index.html . No need for the timeline whatsoever.

For instance for a website you would want your content separated into separate swfs. But lets say I'm building a game, I am not going to want my preloader, splash screens, menu and game all in the same timeline. If I separate those into scenes, it increases manageability and allows me to use a file as a template for other games.
put them in seperate movieclips, not scenes.

@korpka - Most of us do not use scenes anymore but a few pro animators still use them as pointed out by a couple of other posters

put them in seperate movieclips, not scenes.

@korpka - Most of us do not use scenes anymore but a few pro animators still use them as pointed out by a couple of other posters

No. Did you not read my previous post? I have been developing for many many years and have used each method and found slapping them all in movieclips and hiding them is not a wise decision (for certain applications). Scenes are very useful in some cases. Put everything in movieclips in the same scene became popular and faddish a few years back and some still hold to it but its not always the most practical thing and its not good for performance.

It pretty stupid to religiously stick to not using scenes as if its the most terrible thing. Like I said before, each case is different. In the case of game development, performance, organization & scalability are important and balancing the use of scenes and movieclip containers are important.

only use scenes for storyboard animations and games. For doing websites i prefer what stevenlyons does. Unless someone can explain why scenes are better

scenes = bad! use external swfs instead. you can run into a lot of potential problems when using scenes especially since when compiled they become 1 giant timeline. use external swfs to save time on loading and provide far better control through AS.

This is only true in some cases. When you use separate swfs more than they should, you potentially bloat file sizes and actually can sometimes increase development difficulty. In other cases you would want to use an external swf over a scene. This all depends on each situation. But you cant just say scenes are bad and rule them out. There is nothing wrong with splitting a file into several scenes if needed.

For instance for a website you would want your content separated into separate swfs. But lets say I'm building a game, I am not going to want my preloader, splash screens, menu and game all in the same timeline. If I separate those into scenes, it increases manageability and allows me to use a file as a template for other games.

I use scenes. Using lots of movieclips and setting _visible to false still takes a performance hit since they are still rendered, though invisible.
Actually, setting _visible to false stops the movie clip from being drawn to the stage. I'm not arguing for or against scenes, just saying :)

i would say I have yet to find a reason to use scenes. loading swfs is by far the best way to go and does not bloat file size in any way as long as you preload a shared library in the background. then you have all the advantages of scenes without the difficulties and potential problems involved.

does that mean there as absolutely no reason to use them, probably not, but I can't think of a single instance where scenes are better than external swfs or internal mcs save maybe for animation which I do little of except in regards to web design...

thanks guys... I usually do scenes but when you click a button to go to that scene, I then have a preloader that loads an external swf with that scene's content.
By the way what is: "preload a shared library in the background" and how is it done?

I read this thread with X attention as I was also wondering.
I also prefer the external loading swfs way. So Sinister Rouge, just a question about it ( as I still learn and you are surely well informed about the optimum way to do it) :
Let's say that I have as first a swf called intro.swf ( with an animation and embedded in Html)with a button ENTER that calls itself my main menu swf called menu.swf through loadMovie function.
Each button of this menu will call again with loadMovie 5 different swfs.
The question is : do I have to have a preloader for each loaded swf ?
Thank you.

Macromedia/Adobe suggests not using them in most situations.

http://livedocs.macromedia.com/flash/8/main/wwhelp/wwhimpl/common/html/wwhelp.htm?context=LiveDocs_Parts&file=00000401.html

Personally the only time I've used them has been when updating or doing re-designs for sites others have built and they have indeed been a nightmare to work with script-wise.

#If you have any other info about this subject , Please add it free.#

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Do you use scenes? do you reverse? preload?