Flash 8 Cookbook

9.13. Creating Interactive Custom Cursors

Problem

You want to create a cursor that can change state depending on what the user is doing.

Solution

Create a cursor movie clip symbol with three keyframes labeled up, over, and press. Then, create ActionScript code for the cursor instance such as described in the discussion.

Discussion

After you have created a basic custom cursor, you may discover that you want the cursor to respond to various events by changing state. When you use the default cursor, for example, it changes from an arrow to a hand icon when the user moves the mouse over an object with button event handlers. When you use a custom cursor, you do not get this behavior inherently. You can, however, create a cursor that responds in the same way. And, in addition, if you want, you can create a special press state for the cursor as well—a state that is activated whenever the user clicks the mouse button. The first step in creating an interactive custom cursor is to create the three states within the movie clip symbol. You can do this by doing the following:

• Rename the default layer in the symbol’s timeline to Labels.

• Define three keyframes on the Labels layer. Label these keyframes (in this order) up, over, and press.

• Create a new layer named Artwork.

• On the Artwork layer define three keyframes that match up with the keyframes in the Labels layer.

• On each of the keyframes of the Artwork layer, place the artwork that corresponds to the state for that label. For example, on the frame ...