RE: FLASH: screen size

[Ben Deroo]

Hi Len,


I must apologize for thanking you  so late for the help you so expertly

provided with my question about screen size.

I do have a pretty good reason for this though! Last week my system gave up

on me (after spending a late night learning the flash basics ....again) It

crashed in a most impressive way ( I have a AMD K6-2 350..) I am certain

that it has nothing to do with flash3 -atleast I hope so- but since I was

stupid enough not to have any partitions on my hard drive, and the only

option left (after consulting with a programmer friend of mine) was too do a

fdisk and format C, I was forced to reinstall all of my software. Offcourse

I never made any significant back-ups so all my data got lost too . All of

it !! Those countless dozens of hors spent making my first flash movie that

was to be somewhat presentable... gone.


Anyway, now that I have everything up and running again, I thought I'd get

started reading the 325 mails from this mailing list. So here I am, beaten

but not defeated. Poised for the flash battle once again. And thanking you

for the help you provide to a lowly amateur. I must say that I am impressed

with the knowledge and expertise that seems to show thru in this mailing

list. I hope some day to be able to provide the help you all have.


Thanks ,   Ben



> -----Original Message-----

>

From: ownershocker [dot] com [ownershocker [dot] com]On">mailto:ownershocker [dot] com]On Behalf Of Len

> Harrison

> Sent: woensdag 18 november 1998 6:53

>

To: flashershocker [dot] com

> Subject: RE: FLASH: screen size

>

>

> Hi Ben,

>

> Since Flash is a vector format, it will rescale to any size you

> like. I tend

> to use 100%x100% which will make your movie fill the browser

> window through

> resizing. There's a problem with this, however, which is either

> *extremely*

> significant or no-big-deal depending on your content and intention. Since

> most of what I do is instructional, it's not a really big deal for me, but

> it might be for you.

>

> When you allow the movie to scale this way, the aspect ratio can

> be changed

> by the user to something very different from your original intention.

> Circles and squares become ovals and rectangles, for example. If you don't

> want this to happen, you have three options:

>

> 1) Open a new browser window for your movie in the aspect (and size) you

> want. If you wish to design for the lowest common denominator

> that would be

> something less than 640x480 (on Windows you have the start bar at

> the bottom

> which is about 50 pixels, for example). Although some don't like this

> approach, it's one I prefer and use frequently even when I'm not

> working in

> Flash. I tend to want my stuff to take over the environment while the user

> is working with it and don't like to design around the many different

> toolbar layouts. Also I don't do stuff that uses scrollbars and I do do

> screenshots. With that combination you really do need to know what size

> canvas you have to work with and that's client area, not window

> area. If you

> really want to get tricky, do a screen resolution detection in the browser

> before you open the window and then you can scale your movie to the user's

> display. I've done this quite successfully with CSS and HTML using

> document.write to select which stylesheet to use on the fly.

> That's a bit of

> work, but worth it. In Flash it would be a piece of cake. Note that with

> this approach, you still size your movie to be 100%x100%.

>

> 2) Specify a specific size for your movie that is small enough to

> accomodate

> your lowest target audience and, optionally, put it in a centered table

> since Flash doesn't seem to center horizontally effectively (or is that

> something I missed? I don't use this option much).

>

> 3) Specify a specific size for your movie and put it inside a

> floating frame

> that is centered in the user's browser. This tends to be my second choice

> when doing anything involving Web. Basically you define 5 frames,

> one above,

> one below, one two the left, and one to the right of your content frame.

> Specify absolute dimensions for your content frame and set the

> rest of them

> to "*". Result is a frame that floats center screen and more or less

> centered top and bottom, depending on how small the user makes the window.

>

> It's important to remember that your movie will scale to any size

> you want.

> So you can easily design at one size and then shrink it down or expand it

> out with no loss. The one exception to this is if you use bitmaps inside

> your movie. They'll still be bitmaps unless you trace them and

> will exhibit

> all the usual effects of resizing.

>

> hth,

>

> len harrison

> instructional designer

>

lenhabtcorp [dot] com

>

> > -----Original Message-----

>

> From: ownershocker [dot] com [ownershocker [dot] com]On">mailto:ownershocker [dot] com]On Behalf

> > Of Ben Deroo

> > Sent: Tuesday, November 17, 1998 4:40 PM

>

> To: flashershocker [dot] com

> > Subject: FLASH: screen size

> >

> >

> > How the heck can I make my movie fit a browser window ?? What

> > size movie do

> > you all use ?? 550x400 or ??

> > Sorry bout my simple question

> >

> > � http://home2.planetinternet.be <http://home2.planetinternet.be>

> > /benderoo

>

> ben [dot] derooplanetinternet [dot] be <ben [dot] derooplanetinternet [dot] be (mailto:ben [dot] derooplanetinternet [dot] be)>

> > >

> >

> >

> > --------------------------------------------------------------

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