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Tutorial - Preloading External Flash Movies

Free Flash Tutorial

Step Nine: The External SWF Movie

In your external Flash Movie that you want to load you MUST add 2 blank frames at the very beginning on the Movie. It is probably easiest to just create a new scene. This first Scene must be the first thing to load. In the first frame you mush have a stop(); command and in the second frame you must add the label: Play and a play(); command. This is how to do it:

1. Open the Movie that you wish to use as your: External Flash Movie
2. Open the Scene Panel: Window > Other Panels > Scenes (Shift F2)
   
   Every Flash Movie has at least one Scene by default. So unless you have created any Scenes you will see something like this:
   
   
   The Scene Panel.
   
   
3. Double Click on the Scene 1 Label and rename it: Main Content
   
   
   Scene 1 renamed.
   
   
4. Click on the Add Scene button:
   
   
   You now have two Scenes.
   
   
5. Rename Scene 1 to: External Preloader
   
   
   Scene 2 has been re-named.
   
   

Note: The Flash Movie plays from the top Scene down which means that the Preloader will play after the Main Content. Not much point in that!!

6. Drag the new External Preloader Scene to the top:
   
   
   The Scene order is now correct.
   
   
7. Click on the External Preloader Label in the Scene Panel to go to the new Scene. Go to: External Preloader Scene
   
   
8. Add the following ActionScript to Frame 1:

stop();

9. Right click on Frame 2 and select: Insert Blank Keyframe (not Insert Frame)
   
   
10. If the Property Inspector is closed, open it: Window > Properties (Ctrl F3)
    
    
11. Give frame 2 the following Label: Play (This is case sensitive)
    
    
    Frame Label: Play
    
    
12. Add the following ActionScript to Frame 2 :

play();

The External Flash Movie is now complete. Except of course you have to add the real content in the Main Scene.

Warning: If you create a Flash Movie that loops (such as the animation in the example at the beginning of this tutorial) then you need to make sure that the Main content layer(s) does not loop back to this first preloader Scene. Otherwise the stop(); will stop the loop and the animation will cease to animate. In my example that I used at the top of this tutorial I placed the following ActionScript at the end of the Main Content Scene:

    gotoAndPlay (1);

This causes the animation to loop back to frame1 of the Main Scene and play again. If I did not do this the Movie would (by default) go back to Frame 1 of the first Scene and stop. As the main Movie has already loaded the external preloader would no longer nude the main Movie onto action - so the stop would be permanent.

Well that is all there is to it. Enjoy.

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