Software Skills Diary

Aim 01/02/2018

Open macromedia director, set up stage size and import assets.

Evidence

Opening macromedia director caused this page to appear

Clicking “director File” under the “create new” section

caused the director workspace window to appear.
To set the stage size to fit the client’s requirements I first clicked on the “movie” tab in the property
inspector and then in the stage size section typed in the client’s desired stage size (1200x200)

Next to import my assets into

director I selected file then import
 I then opened my assets folder for
unit 65

I then selected all the assets I

needed and then selected import,
this imported all the assets into the
cast list

Learnt

In this lesson, I have learnt

how to set the stage size
to 1200 x 200 and import
assets into macromedia
director.
Aim 01/02/18

Add logo and produce band animation

Evidence

I first dragged the

Pixels logo onto the
stage.

To make the pixel logo appear with

a pixelated effect from the code
library I selected animation, then
sprite transitions, then pixelate. I
then dragged the pixelate animation
onto the pixels logo.
 After dragging the pixelate effect
onto the logo this parameter option
box appeared. In this box, I chose to
have the animation play at the
beginning of the sprite and set the
duration of the animation to last
100 frames.

After clicking play the pixelated

animation played and lasted for 100
frames.

Next I dragged the cast member

titled “pixels guitarist (position 1)”
onto the stage.
Next from the code library I opened
animation, then automatic then
cycle graphics

Dragging the cycle graphics onto the

pixel’s guitarist image caused this
parameter option box to appear, I
set the first member of the series as
“Pixels Guitarist (position 1) and the
last member of the series as “Pixels
Guitarist (position 2)”. I set two
images to play for one second after
each other continuously.

Now when the video is played it looks

like the guitarist is moving his hand up
and down to strum the guitar.
 An identical process was carried out
for the two remaining band
members.

I decided I would like to have the band members appear at the same time, and with the same
pixelated transition as the logo. To achieve this I had to move the three sprites down the timeline
to last 100 frames. I then copied each sprite, put it to play straight after the previous one (when
the sprites appear) and removed the cycle graphics function I then added the pixelated transition
affect to the three sprites. Now the band members and the logo appear at the same time with
the same pixelated transition, and then once they appear the band members start to play.

Learnt

In this lesson I have learned how to add the pixelate effect to assets, and how to use a parameter box to set things such as
the duration of the animation. I have learnt how to use cycle graphics function to produce an animation.
Aim 02/02/18

Add flashing “national tour” text to banner, add background music to banner, add falling text to banner. Publish project.

Next I added the text “NATIONAL TOUR” to the banner. This was done by selecting the text option in the tool box,
typing “NATIONAL TOUR”, selecting the “slim thin pixelettes” font and then positioning and resizing the text to fit the
banner as shown.

To get the text to disappear and then reappear again repeatedly I copied the cast member and then
copied and recopied the cast member multiple times with a break of 20 frames in between.

Next I added the background music to the web banner to do this I had to click a very well hidden button
that would open up the sound and effect channels, with this section open I simply dragged the mp3 asset
onto the timeline and extended it to play across all frames.
Now I will have to add the automatic scrolling text that will go down the web banner detailing
information such as the tour dates and venues of the pixels band. I decided I would like the scrolling text
to appear around halfway through the animation to find the half way point I divided the total number of
frames (1000) by 2 and used this as the frame number where the scrolling text will appear. I would like
the scrolling text to take the place of the “NATIONAL TOUR” text-as in the flashing national tour text will
disappear half way through and the falling down text will replace it. First of all I removed all the repeating
national tour text assets that appeared after the 500th frame. This was done by selecting the assets and
pressing delete on the keyboard.

To add the falling text,

I first selected the text
tool.
 I then added the
“M.E.N. arena text.

Then in the code library, under

sprite transitions I selected the
“slide option”

After dragging the “slide” option

onto the text the parameter box
appeared. From this parameter box
I inputted that I would like the
transition to appear at the
beginning of the sprite, that I would
like the animation to last ten
frames, and that I would like the
text to go slide from the top of the
banner to the bottom.

Now the “M.E.N. ARENA”

text slides down onto the
banner.
 An identical process was carried out
for the 3 other venue titles. The
titles were spaced 30 frames apart.

Now I will have to add the prices of

the tickets to the web banner.
Similar to before I selected the text
option, I then typed out “ADULTS:
£20.00”

I then selected and dragged the slide

transition onto the text, this again
opened up the parameter box. This
time instead of selecting top to
bottom I selected right to left.
Now the text slides onto the banner
from right to left.

The same process was repeated for

the “CHILDREN: £10.00” text.

Next I added the falling text that

details the dates of the tour. I
selected the text tool and typed
out the text

M.E.N ARENA 10/0718

O2 ARENA 10/07/18

WEMBLEY ARENA 20/07/18

SHEFFIELD ARENA 25/07/18

I added the same slide effect as

before causing the text to slide
down the banner.
 I originally wanted to add a background to the banner of a pixelated city, however I decided that
having any background would make the text hard to read, and I also enjoy the contrast between
the colourful pixelated characters and the clean white background.

To add a bit of last minute interactivity to my web banner, I decided I would like it to be possible
for the user to move the band members around the banner. To do this I found the “draggable”
option in the code library under interactive animation, I dragged this code onto each of the
sprites and now the user can move the sprites around the banner.

Now the band members can be

dragged around the banner

With that addition my web banner

was complete. Now I had to publish
my web banner this was done by
clicking file then publish settings.
I then set for the project to be
exported as a projector file.

The project was then published into

a projector file and completed.
Learnt

In this lesson I have learnt how to Add flashing “national tour” text to banner, add background music to
banner, add falling text to banner. Publish project.

Today I have learned how to produce flashing text by copying and pasting a text asset, I have learned how to
add background music by opening effects channels, I have learnt how to add falling text to a banner using the
slide code, and I have learned how to publish director projects as projector files.