Flash 8 Cookbook

7.9. Optimizing Static Text for Minimum File Size

Problem

You want to optimize the Flash movie’s file size by using fonts on the client computer rather than embedding the fonts in the SWF.

Solution

Select the static text, and check the Use Device Fonts checkbox in the Property inspector.

Discussion

When you use static text in your movies, Flash embeds the font outline in the Flash movie by default. This result has several benefits:

• Embedded fonts are anti-aliased, resulting in smoother-looking text at larger point sizes.

• Embedded fonts can be scaled, rotated, and alpha tweened.

• The text will always appear in the correct font regardless of what client is playing the movie.

Although it may sound like embedded fonts are the optimal solution in every scenario, they have at least one major drawback: embedded fonts increase file size. If you embed the font outlines for every character in a font, it can add 10KB or more for a standard Latin character font. It can add even more when you embed nonstandard Latin characters. Double-byte fonts, such as those used for Chinese and Japanese, can require significantly more file size.

Static text fields embed fonts by default. However, they embed the outlines only for the characters they use. Therefore, a short text field with only a few characters isn’t likely to add much in terms of file size to a SWF. However, if you need to embed the outlines for a font in order to display paragraphs of text, it’s likely that it will add significantly more to the file ...