Using Director > Animation > Using film loops |  |

Using film loops

A film loop is an animated sequence that you can use like a single cast member. For example, to create an animation of a bird flying across the Stage, you can create a film loop of the sequence of cast members that shows the bird flapping its wings. Instead of using the frame-by-frame technique, you create a sprite containing only the film loop and then animate it across as many frames as you need. When you run the animation, the bird flaps its wings and at the same time moves across the Stage.

You can also use film loops to consolidate Score data. Film loops are especially helpful when you want to reduce the number of sprite channels you're using. You can combine several Score channels into a film loop in a single channel.

To determine if a film loop is cropped or scaled within a sprite's bounding rectangle and to make the film loop repeat or mute its sounds, you use the Film Loop Cast Member properties. See Setting film loop properties.

Film loops are useful for animating repetitive motions and combining sprites to use fewer channels.

To create a film loop:

1 | In the Score, select the sprites you want to turn into a film loop.
| Use sprites in as many channels as you need in film loops—even in the sound channel. Select sequences in all the channels you want to be part of the film loop. You can select sprite fragments if you first select a sprite and choose Edit > Edit Sprite Frames. Control-click (Windows) or Command-click (Macintosh) to select sequences that aren't in adjacent channels.
2 | Choose Insert > Film Loop.
| A dialog box appears asking you to name the film loop.
3 | Enter a name for the film loop.
| Director stores all the Score data and cast member references as a new film loop cast member.

Note: Drag a selection from the Score to the Cast window to quickly create a film loop cast member in that position.

A film loop behaves just like any other cast member, with a few exceptions:

| When you step through an animation that contains a film loop (either by using Step Forward or Step Backward or by dragging the playback head in the Score), the film loop doesn't animate. Animation occurs only when the movie is running.
| You can't apply ink effects to a film loop. If you want to use ink effects with a film loop, you need to apply them to the sprites that make up the animation before you turn the animation into a film loop.
| Lengthening or shortening a sprite that contains a film loop doesn't affect how fast the film loop plays. It changes the number of times the film loop cycles.

Director provides three other ways of incorporating a completed animation into a movie as a discrete element: you can export it as a digital video (QuickTime or AVI), save and import it as a linked Director movie, or play it in a window in another Director movie.

Note: If you need to edit a film loop and you've deleted the original Score data it was based on, it's possible to restore the Score data for editing. Copy the film loop cast member to the Clipboard, select a cell in the Score, and then paste. Director pastes the original Score data instead of the film loop.