Problem with Flash MX button

I'm trying to develop a button with an up and over state consisting of 2 graphics of the same image, one color, one b&w. I would like to have text fly in from the side onto the button when in the over state. What I have done is: On the stage on the over state, I insert a symbol, specifying it as a movie and then set up my initial and final frames. I also specify the button size as the hit state since I don't want the text that's off the button to be activated.

The button works as I want except that if the cursor lands on the text as it comes into the button, I get a flashing or stuttering between the original image, the over image and the text, with the result that one usually predominates. Anywhere else on the button (outside of the text animation), it works fine. Any ideas on how to get rid of this annoying stuttering or flashing?

I'd also like to have the text reverse its motion when the cursor leaves the button. How is that done?

re the text, break it apart - select the text and press Ctrl-B twice.

to reverse the tween, use a movieclip instead of a button - take the graphics from your button and put it in a clip with frames labelled _up, _over, _down and rollOut - these maybe one frame only or in the case of _over and _rollOut will include your tween. Put a stop() action on frame 1 (_up) then put some code like this on the main timeline:



that's all you need - the _up, _over and _down frames are recognised by flash as the button states for any clip that has a button type event handler applied to it, eg onRollOut. This is the better way to make any button in mx, even ones that down't need to do anything fancy, co then you can apply other movieclip methods etc.

Thanks, that does the trick . One small item, though, is that the tweening needs to be changed from 'motion' to 'shape'.

Tim

JamieB,

I've tried your alternative method for animated buttons, but am not having any success. Do you have an .fla file that uses this method that you could send to me?

Tim

can do, but sorry I don't have access to flash at the mo (when we can flash on linux without wine I'll be happy ) will post something when i get the chance...

hello to the other flash developer that dont use mac or windows

Does anyone have a sample .fla that uses the button method that jamieB describes? I can send my personal email if that helps.

here you go dr tim - you'll see that I was underestimating what's needed slightly, cos the default behavious with a clip with _up, _over etc frames and one or more button handlers is to gotoAndStop at the relevent frame - no good for your tween....so I added the onRollOver and onRollOut handlers in code....


also, this is pretty crude cos when you rollout on the button mc the rollOut tween starts from the beginning every time - but maybe you've only just rolled onto it so that looks weird - mouse on and off the button quickly and you'll see what I mean....if this bothers you then it's pretty easy to solve, but you'd use a different method - have just one tween from offstage to central position and when you mouse on the button set a variable to say "keep moving one frame at a time left to right till you get to the middle" but when you mouse off that would then be saying "keep moving one frame at a time till you get to the other extreme..." so you would go in and out smoothly - let me know if you want more detail on that.

I hope this helps you man, I booted windows! (I normally just flash at work)

Thanks, jamieB!

I'll take a look at it and let you know how it goes.

Tim

JAMIEb, YOU'RE A LIFESAVER!

The .fla works great. Actually, I only want the animation to last about 5 or 6 frames (at 12fps) so the momentary mouseover doesn't present a problem. It actually looks better if it only partially comes on the screen.

Thanks again!

Tim

great