Flash CS5: The Missing Manual

Making Shapes Move with Bones

There are two ways to use bones. You can use IK Bones to link symbols together, creating a chain of objects (as described on Linking Symbols with Bones) or you can add bones to the inside of a shape, making that shape bendable and flexible. It's kind of like dressing up a group of bones inside a costume. Though both of these methods rely on an armature made up of bones, the techniques you use to make them work are quite different.

You can add bones to a single shape, or you can add bones to more than one shape. The word "group" isn't used here, since you can't combine the shapes using the Group commands. The way you add bones to more than one shape is to select all the shapes that you're going to include before you add the first bone. Flash then automatically places those selected shapes in the pose layer.

In this exercise, you'll animate a snake by placing several bones inside it. Unlike a robot, snakes don't have limbs, but you can still give them plenty of bones. Download 09-4_Shape_Bones.fla from the Missing CD page at www.missingmanuals.com/cds.

1. Open 09-4_Shape_Bones.fla.

   The lovely rattlesnake is made up of several shapes: a body, a tongue, and two eyes.

2. Zoom in on the front section.

   To place bones precisely inside a shape, it helps to zoom in for a close view. Then, if you need to get a view of a different part of the shape, you can use the Hand tool to reposition the object on the stage. As mentioned earlier, it also helps to turn off object snapping ...