Due: Thursday, 6 July, 2000, beginning of class.

Complete the following activities. You may work in pairs.

Activity 1. Using Auto Distort. In this activity you will use the Auto Distort feature to make a movie of wheel moving.

1. Open the movie that contains the wheel:
   1. Open the movie "Wheel". It is found in the "Software" folder under the Nova class account. Look in the "Lab 2" folder.

   2. Make the cast window active.

   3. Double-click the thumbnail of the wheel to display it in the paint window.

   4. point to the selection rectangle and hold down the mouse button to display the pop-up menu. Make sure Shrink is selected.

   5. Drag a box around the wheel to select it.

   6. Click the free rotate button at the top of the window.

   7. Drag any of the corners in a complete circle around the center of the wheel. Make sure the wheel stays selected.

2. Create the intermediate cast members with Auto Distort:
   1. Choose Auto Distort from the Xtras menu.

   2. Type 12 as the number of cast members you want to create and click Begin.

   3. Close the paint window.

3. Move the cast members that make up the rotating wheel to the score:
   1. Select cell 1 in channel 2 of the score.

   2. Arrange the score and the cast window so channel 2 of the score is visible when the cast window is active.

   3. Resize the cast window so you can see all the wheel cast members at the same time.

   4. In the cast window, select cast member 2, and then Shift-click cast member 14 to select the entire sequence.

   5. Choose Cast to Time from the Modify menu.

4. Make the background of the wheel cast members transparent so you can see the scene behind the wheel between the spokes as the wheel turns.
   1. Double-click the 2 next to channel 2 to select all the cells in the channel.

   2. Choose Bkgnd Transparent from the Ink pop-up menu in the score.

   3. Making sure the cells in channel 2 are still selected, drag the wheel until it's positioned over the cart.

   4. Rewind the movie and play it.

Activity 2. Using registration points. When you're working with an animated sequence that remains in the same spot on the screen--such as the rotating wheel in the previous activity--it's important that the registration points of all the cast members be aligned precisely to make the animation look right. The problem is taken care of for you when you use Auto Distort because as Director creates each cast member in the sequence, it keeps the registration point in the same position.

When you're creating cast members spearately, however, you have to make sure the registratio point for each cast member in a sequence is set correctly. When you create a series of images, either in Director or in another program, you need to define a fixed point around which the images can move or change shape.

When you import a series of cast members, Director places each one's registration point at the center of the image. That works well whey you're dealing with a set of cast members that are all exactly the same size. If you have, for example, an arm in motion, each image will be slightly taller than the one before it. You can't use the Align command to line up these images because it aligns the rectangle surrounding the image, not the image itself.

The solution is to move the registration point to part of the image that remains in the same place throughout the animation: a cross hair placed by the artist near the bottom edge of the example arm.

1. Changing the position of the registration point on a series of images.
   1. Open the file "Weeping" that is in the class folder.

   2. Double-click cast member 3 to display it in the paint window.

   3. Use the right and left arrows on the keyboard to flip back and forth trought the four cast members. You can see that their alignment is slightly off.

   4. Display cast member 3 in the paint window again. Notice that there's a cross at the bottom (you might have to scroll down a bit to see it).

2. The registration point should be below and to the left of the hand. The artist who created these files placed the mark so that the other images would move correctly relative to this registration point's position. In the next series of steps, you'll move the registration point from the center of the image to where the artist intended it to be.

   Set the registration point for each of the cast members:

   1. Select the registration point tool. Two intersecting lines appear in the paint window. The point where they intersect is the current registration point.

   2. Drag the crosshair to the cross below the cast member. The intersection point of the two lines follows the crosshair as you drag it.

   3. When you have the crosshair positioned precisely over the cross, release the mouse button. The two lines remain aligned with the cross, and the new registration point corresponds to the center of the cross.

   4. Repeat the procedure with each of the other cast members in the sequence, including cast member 2. Cast member 2 is the master shot that all the arm positions are based on. It needs to have the same registration point as the arm positions.

   5. Close the paint window when you're finished.

1. Select frames 2 through 5 in channel 2 to make a copy of the master shot. Don't include cell 1. The first position of the woman's arm is shown in the master shot, and it needs to appear on the stage in frame 1. To do this, you may need to split the sprite. Option click on frame 2, channel 2. Then go to Modify->Split Sprite. Now you can make a copy of only frames 2 through 5.

2. Hold down Option and drag the selected cells down to channel 3. The copies of the master shot appear in cells 2 through 5 of channel 3.

The next step is to use Exchange Cast Members to replace the copies of the master shot in the second through fifth cells in channel 3 with the appropriate sprite in the sequence. When Director replaces one sprite with the other, it positions the registration point of the new sprite in exactly the same position as the old sprite's. The result is that the sprites in the sequence iwll be aligned with each other and with the master shot.

To exchange cast members:

1. If the sprite in channel 2, frames 2 through 5, is all one sprite, then we have to split the sprite before we can exchange. Option click on frame 3, then select Modify->Split Sprite. Repeat for frames 4 and 5.

2. Select cell 2 inchannel 3 of the score.

3. Go to the cast window, select cast member 3, and then choose Exchange Cast Members from the Edit menu. The number in the cell changes to show that Director has replaced the master shot with cast member 3.

4. Repeate the process to replace the master shot in the remaining cells with the appropriate cast members.

5. Rewind the movie and play it. The woman raises her hand to her eyes.

1. If you still have the movie from the previous activity open, save the movie and choose File->new.

2. Open the cast window and click on the first open space after all of you cast members. It is important to have lots of empty consecutive cast boxes.

3. Now open the paint window. We are going to create a flower growing out of a pot. First create the pot.

4. Now choose View -> Onion Skin. The onion skin toolbar appears. The first button on the far left of this toolbar is the "toggle onion skin" button. Click on this.

5. The next two boxes with numbers in them determine how many cast members preceeding the current one (first box) and following the current one (second box) will show. Make sure that the number 1 is in the first box and the number 0 in the second box.

6. Next we must set the background cast member that will remain visible as we make all of our cast members. Make sure that the paint window holds your vase. Then click on the first button to the right of the two boxes with numbers in them. This is the "set background" button. Finally, click the button to the right of one you just checked. This is the "show background" button. If you hold your cursor over these button, their names should appear.

7. Do not click the last button on the right of the onion skin toolbar.

8. Now you are ready to begin. Click the + sign in the top right corner of the paint window to create a new cast member. You should see a dim image of the vase. You are looking at the background image through an "onion skin" so that you can draw the current cast member in relation to it. Now draw a stub of a green stem.

9. Click the + sign again. Now you should see the vase (which is the background) and the previous cast member, both dimly. Draw a slightly longer stem.

10. Click the + sign again. Now you should see the vase (the background) and the previous cast member (the longer stem) but not the cast member before the long stem. If you want to see the short stem also, change the first numbered box in the onion skin toolbar from 1 to 2. This will allow you to see the two previous cast members. Draw a third stem that is longer than the first two and has a bud.

11. Repeat this process until you have at least 7 cast members and a fully open flower.

12. Now close the paint window. Make sure that you can see the cast window and the score. Drag the vase into the score.

13. Now click on the first stem cast member and shift click on the last stem cast member. All of the stem cast members should be highlighted.

14. Click in the score in the frame under the first frame of the vase.

15. Then choose Modify->Cast to Time. The stem cast members should appear in the channel underneath the vase. Make sure they are background transparent.

16. Now extend the stem sprite so that it is as long as the vase sprite. Play your movie. You should see the plant grow out of the vase into a flower.

PostLab 2

Due: Friday, 7 July 2000 at the beginning of class.

Note that you must work individually on the post lab.

Create an animation that performs the following tasks.

1. Create a title screen with your name on it. There is an activity here that shows you how to create a title with different sized letters and with a special background in the paint window. Use this technique to create your title, i.e., your title must have different size text, a background, and be bitmapped. You do not have to turn in the activity but you do have to have a similar title in your movie.

2. Provide a transition between your title screen and the rest of the animation.

3. In the animation there must be a vehicle (car, boat, space craft, etc.) that moves across the screen and hits a stationary object (planet, wall, log, etc.).

4. As the vehicle moves across the screen have some motion such as an arm waving from a window. Use onion skinning to achieve this effect.

5. When the vehicle hits the object it must crunch up. Use auto-distort to achieve this effect. There should also be some noise. Use one of the sounds from the class folder.

6. The vehicle should then flip in some manner and land on its back. Again, you can use auto distort to achieve this effect quickly.

   When you have finished your movie place it in the PostLab 2 folder that is in the Turn-in folder on Nova/user/user_ic/barrj/cs136jb. Name your movie lastName Post 1 with the lastName substituted by your last name.

Last Modified: 2 July 2000

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John Barr, Ithaca College