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Flash CS3  |  Go to CS4 Help

Create or open a document and set its properties

You can create a new document or open a previously saved document in Flash, and you can open a new window as you work. You can set properties for new or existing documents.

For a text tutorial about creating your first Flash file, see Create your First File on the Flash Tutorials page at www.adobe.com/go/learn_fl_tutorials.

For video tutorials, see:

Create a new document

  1. Select File > New.
  2. On the General tab, select Flash Document.

Create a new document of the same type as the last document created (Windows only)

 Click the New File button in the main toolbar.

Create a new document from a template

  1. Select File > New.
  2. Click the Templates tab.
  3. Select a category from the Category list, select a document from the Category Items list, and click OK. You can select standard templates that come with Flash or a template you have already saved.

Open an existing document

  1. Select File > Open.
  2. In the Open dialog box, navigate to the file or enter the path to the file in the Go To box.
  3. Click Open.

Open a new window in the current document

  Select Window > Duplicate Window.

Set properties for a new or existing document

  1. With the document open, select Modify > Document.

    The Document Properties dialog box appears.

  2. To embed metadata within your SWF files, enter a descriptive title in the Title box, and enter a description in the Description box.

    Embedding metadata improves the ability of web-based search engines to return meaningful search results for Flash content. Descriptions can author and copyright information, and short descriptions about the content and its purpose. The search metadata is based on the RDF (Resource Description Framework) and XMP (Extensible Metadata Platform) specifications and is stored in Flash in a W3C-compliant format.

    The title and description you enter is a human readable title and a human readable description. These fields are not intended for keywords to provide greater search results. Instead, these fields are made available to search engines that index SWF files, and display the contents of the title and description field in their search results. Search metadata can be exported to any version of Flash. While it was introduced in Flash 8, Flash Player ignores tags it does not understand, thus Flash 8 exports it to all versions.

    Note: Flash lets you make the settings you specify in the Document Properties dialog box the default settings for any Flash document that you create. The exception to this is the Title and Description, which you need to specify for each Flash document that you create.
  3. For Frame Rate, enter the number of animation frames to appear every second.

    For most computer-displayed animations, especially those playing from a website, 8 frames per second (fps) to 12 fps (the default) is sufficient.

  4. For Dimensions, set the Stage size:

    • To specify the Stage size in pixels, enter values in the Width and Height boxes. The minimum size is 1 x 1 pixels; the maximum is 2880 x 2880 pixels.

    • To set the Stage size so that there is equal space around the content on all sides, click the Contents button to the right of Match. To minimize document size, align all elements to the upper-left corner of the Stage, and then click Contents.

    • To set the Stage size to the maximum available print area, click Printer. This area is determined by the paper size minus the current margin selected in the Margins area of the Page Setup dialog box (Windows) or the Print Margins dialog box (Macintosh).

    • To set the Stage size to the default size, 550 x 400 pixels, click Default.

  5. To set the background color of your document, click the triangle in the Background Color control and select a color from the palette.
  6. To specify the unit of measure for rulers that you can display along the top and side of the application window, select an option from the pop‑up menu in the upper right. (This setting also determines the units used in the Info panel.)
  7. Do one of the following:

    • To make the new settings the default properties for the current document only, click OK.

    • To make the new settings the default properties for all new documents, click Make Default.

Change document properties using the Property inspector

  1. Deselect all assets, then select the Selection tool.
  2. In the Property inspector (Window > Properties > Properties), click the Size control to display the Document Properties dialog box.
  3. To select a background color, click the triangle in the Background color control and select a color from the palette.
  4. For Frame Rate, enter the number of animation frames to appear every second.
  5. For Publish, click the Settings button to display the Publish Settings dialog box with the Flash tab selected. For more information, see Publishing Flash documents.
  6. If you are developing content for mobile devices such as cell phones, click the Settings button to display the Device Settings dialog box, which lets you choose devices to test mobile content and provides information on ActionScript support for each device you select.
    Note: The Device Settings button can be used only if your publish settings are set to a supported version of Flash Lite.


Comments

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Comments


capheen said on Oct 11, 2007 at 5:52 AM :
What is the purpose of "Duplicate Window"? I would think it would be practical for creating a second view port. However, whenever I use this command, it prevents me from saving any changes. Further more, the document remains 'read only' until I restart Flash. If I simply close and open the document again, it's still locked. This doesn't really make sense to me.
Jay4 said on Feb 21, 2008 at 4:42 PM :
The Duplicate Window commend is useful for viewing different parts of your document in different document windows. For example, you might want to view frame 1 of the Timeline in one window and frame 50 in another window. This lets you make quick comparisons of different sections of your file. You should be able to save changes and open and close the file normally.

 

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