Free photoshop and flash tutorials

Car Acceleration Tutorial

Mon, 8 Dec 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this flash actionscript 3.0 tutorial you will see how to make a car move more realistic then just moving back and forth, we will add some acceleration and de acceleration functionality so the car start up slow and increases in speed until it ends at a max speed, then when we want to stop it also need to slow down before it stops.

And it all should be looking like this.

First you may prepare some graphics for you stage, I guess you can do better then I did, I just made a fast one here. One simple tip I will tell you is to add a drop shadow to your object, so it looks like its standing on some kind of ground.

Now the only thing we need on the stage is some kind of car, just draw something or put in one if you have one. Convert it to a movie clip and give it the instance name "car".

Now we are ready for the actionscript part, so open up your actionscript panel and type in the code below.

First we need some variables to control some stuff, like telling us which key is pressed, the speed of the car, friction and acc..

  var rightKeyDown:Boolean;
  var leftKeyDown:Boolean;
  var keyPressed:int;
  var speed = 0.5;
  var cs = 0;
  var friction = 0.96;

Usually I always put an init function, we could just type it outside any function, but it all looks more structured with a init function for all the code that should be run at program start.

First the function makes sure to tell flash that no keys is down.

Then we add to eventlisteners, one for the key down, and one for key up, to call a function no matter what key is hit.

startMe();
function startMe():void {
	leftKeyDown = false;
	rightKeyDown = false;
	stage.addEventListener(KeyboardEvent.KEY_DOWN, pressKey);
	stage.addEventListener(KeyboardEvent.KEY_UP, releaseKey);
}

This next function "filters" what key is down, if its the left or right, then add some function if its the one or other.

function pressKey(event:KeyboardEvent):void {
	keyPressed = event.keyCode;
	if (keyPressed == Keyboard.LEFT) {
		leftKeyDown = true;
	}
	if (keyPressed == Keyboard.RIGHT) {
		rightKeyDown = true;
	}
	car.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, driveCar);
}

And here is the function that has the most important code, it actually makes the car move, when the right key is down.

function driveCar(event:Event):void { if (leftKeyDown) { cs -= speed; } if (rightKeyDown) { cs += speed; } car.x += cs; cs *= friction; }

As you may have noticed in the startMe function we also added an eventlistner to listen to when the key is UP again, that is no key is down, so we can stop the car again.

function releaseKey(event:KeyboardEvent):void {
	var key_:int = event.keyCode;
	if (key_ == Keyboard.LEFT) {
		leftKeyDown = false;
	}
	if (key_ == Keyboard.RIGHT) {
		rightKeyDown = false;
	}
}

And that''s it, if you had any problem with the code, you may download the source code below, and test the car function through there.

Download button

Work with Arrays in Actionscript 3 part 2

Thu, 6 Nov 2008 08:23:00 EST

Not so long ago I made a tutorial on how to make and use simple one dimensional arrays with flash actionscript 3.0, now we will go a bit a further and develop our skill to create multidimensional arrays.

Not that this is more complex then the first, one dimensional array, but its worth while digging into, so if you think your ready, lets get started.

There are different kinds of multidimensional arrays, the one we will be dealing with now is using a technique to nest arrays into each other, another way, which we will get into in another article is to create data of the data type object. I won''t get into this right now, because that''s another story for later.

First we will define a simple array with two other arrays nested inside it, then I''ll show you how to call the data from it.

var myArray:Array = new Array(new Array("one","two"), new Array("three", "four"));
trace(myArray);

As you see if you test this example, you get an output trace with all the items one two three and four, this looks simple, but this time I promise you, it will get a bit more complicated.

Now we only want to extract some of the data, lets say two and four.

var myArray:Array = new Array(new Array("one","two"), new Array("three", "four"));
trace(myArray[0][1]);
trace(myArray[1][1]);

Lets take a look at how we extract the item "two", first we call the myArray, tells it to get into the first array (0 indexed) and take its second item "two" (has the index 1).

The second trace does the same, first we call the myArray, tells it to get into the second array (indexed 1) and again we want to extract the second item "four" (has index 1).

Okay that was simple, but think if we had 4 or even 10 arrays nested, then it will demand some thinking..

Put our knowledge to good use!

And now that we have learned the basics of how to construct a multidimensional array, what should we do with it?

Well lets say you are building a simple board game, it could be chess, it could be something else, but what board games got in common is they usually are build up by a grid in some way, chess got white and black squares. What we can do then is to construct that grid with a multi dimensional array. I will show you an example and try to explain how its made up.

var gridSize:int = 2;
var mainArr:Array = new Array(gridSize);
var i:int;
var j:int;
for (i = 0; i < gridSize; i++) {
	mainArr[i] = new Array(gridSize);
    for (j = 0; j < gridSize; j++) {
        mainArr[i][j] = "[" + i + "][" + j + "]";
    }
}
trace(mainArr);

This might seem a bit confusing, but try to test the code, you should get something like this. [0][0],[0][1],[1][0],[1][1] this is a two dimensional array, shown as a grid, you can refer to each column or row, as you can see now you can add to a three dimensional array or four to make big grids.

First we create a variable called gridsize to tell how many rows we want, this will be 2, then we set a main array object to hold it all.

We declare two variables i and j one for each column, we just add to this if we want more columns.

Finally we loop through the site (rows) for both j and i columns and set the values of each items in the arrays.

In the next array tutorial we will create array objects containing objects with seperate properties and values, like I explained in the description above.

Glossy Error Icon Tutorial

Mon, 3 Nov 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this tutorial I will show you how to make my very glossy error message icon using Adobe Photoshop.

See what we will be making just below.

First we need to make the outer border of the ellipse shape, so with the ellipse tool drag out a circle (the color doesn''t matter we will change it later).

In the layers panel double click the new shape layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it settings as shown below.

And here is the metallic gradient I made..

Now your ellipse should look something like this.

Now that was the first part, easy right? the next stage is to make the inner ellipse, (the red shape), so with the ellipse tool drag out a new shape, a bit smaller, so it looks like the one below.

Again go to the layers styles panel and give this shape the following style settings.

And now the result should look like this.

Yes I know this is a lot of settings for such a little effect, but I promise its worth it..

Now lets make the X in the middle, you can use the custom shape tool to make one, or the text tool and use a custom font the make a cool variation, bit I didn''t, I quite liked the standard X with crisp corners.

Now yet again go to the layers styles panel and give it the following settings.

Now we are almost done, we only need the final touch, but its one of the most important things, the glossy effect.

We will be making this 3 times, using the same technique on 3 different places, so I will only show it once.

Hold down ctrl and click the outer ellipse shape layer to load the shapes selection.

Choose the elliptical selection tool, set the selection mode to subtract from selection, and drag over the selection as shown below.

Finally we will make a gradient going from white to transparent and drag it in the selection to make the glossy effect.

Now as I wrote before, you will need to repeat this last step two more times to accomplish the full effect as I did.

That''s it for now, I hope you enjoyed it.

Ultimate Halloween Icons Collection

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 08:23:00 EST

Happy halloween or what else people are saying these days, I have actually been working on this post for some time now, collecting useful links with halloween stuff, in this post you will find almost every single halloween related icons there exist (only free icons of cause).

So lets start the list, its going to be quite a big one.

Iconshock.com - Some really cool and detailed halloween icons, quite new release I think.

Icondrawer.com - You must agree with me, this is the best and most detailed icon set, this halloween icons gets 10 out of 10 on my scale, good job.

Deleket - deviantart.com - As you guys might have noticed I spend a lot of time on deviantart, and have also contributed a couple of times, so here is some great halloween icons from deviantart, kind of smiley theme.

Freeiconsdownload.com - What is a halloween without a pumpkin, so here you go, some crazy halloween pumpkin icons.

Freeiconsdownload.com - Yes some more pumpkin icons. They are really cool and very nicely detailed.

Iconspedia.com - Iconspedia is a great archive for icons, they have a huge storage of cool icons, here is a big collection of their halloween icons.

benjigarner - deviantart.com - Again I stumbled on some icons from deviantart, for those who don''t know deviantart, I can say, they have a huge archive of everything you will ever need.

Iconfactory.com - As you can see from the next few examples, iconfactory has a lot of halloween theme icons, they are really nice and sweet, or scary maybe.

Iconfactory.com

Icons-land.com

Littlerainey.com - What is a halloween without some monsters, so here you got everything from a ghost, witch, jason voorhees and many more, they are just so great.

Iconarchive.com - Some more scary halloween icons.

Sniffels - deviantart.com - Also I think these are quite new, I haven''t seen them around before, but they are cool.

hybridworks - deviantart.com - Yes again some halloween pumpkins for you all.

Vector4free.com - And here I just slipped in an rss icon, with halloween theme, just that this is the first one I have seen of these, quite nice and clean.

Smashingmagazine.com - This new halloween icons from smashingmagazine should be brand new, just released, so enjoy them.

kearone - deviantart.com

Turbomilk.com - I know these are not really halloween icons, but they are cute monsters and monsters are some how related to halloween so I included them anyway.

Now you have something to look at until I make a collection for christmas icons and other holiday collections, so you have something to look forward to.

Abstract High Res wallpapers

Mon, 27 Oct 2008 08:23:00 EST

Today I felt a bit creative, take a look at these new abstract wallpaper I just made. You are welcome to download them use them and share with your friends.

I would be happy if you mentioned me if you share this.

And as you know, I don''t mind anybody commenting on my work, and helping to improve our work here.

These wallpapers are made in Adobe photoshop, so below you can download the photoshop file and a jpg file with the wallpapers.

All wallpapers are 1600 by 1200 px, so the resolution should be okay for most screens.

Download button

I hope you like my new work, look back later to see more of my work.

Work with Arrays in Actionscript 3

Fri, 24 Oct 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this lesson we will talk about making and using arrays with actionscript 3. Arrays is a HUGE topic, so I have decided to split it into 2 or 3 articles (not sure yet, but we will see).

In this first lesson we will talk about what arrays are, how to use them, and make our own simple one dimensional array.

In the next tutorial we will add more advanced theory to the arrays, such as multi dimensional arrays, making objects and adding properties to the array objects to make the arrays hold much more information then just a flat 1 dimensional array.

What is an array?

An array is kind of a data type, like a string, variable and so on, which means its purpose in life is to contain data. An array is usually made to contain more then one information, like a list of information. We could load a list of image url''s into and array like so [img1.jpg] [img2.jpg] [img3.jpg] [img4.jpg].

One thing I use arrays to a lot is to hold data sets from a database, or an xml file, so I can close my database connection after the data is loaded, and only needs to call the array data when needed. Its much easier and much faster, I will get into that in one of the more advanced array lessons.

How to make and use an array?

Now here is how to declare a simple array list, and put some simple one dimensional data into it.

This is the most simple form of an array, here is an example.

var myArray:Array = new Array("a", "b", "c");
trace(myArray[0]);
trace(myArray[1]);
trace(myArray[2]);

What we did here was to declare a variable with the name "myArray" and give it 3 data items, a, b and c.

You may have noticed how easy it is to trace an array item just by calling the myArray[number].

If you think this was simple, just wait to see how simple it is to add items and much more.

myArray.push("d");

That''s it, now lets bring it all together, lets try to add a couple of items to the list, then output all the items with a loop, we will count how many items the array holds, then loop through each item.

var myArray:Array = new Array("a", "b", "c");
myArray.push("d");
myArray.push("e");
myArray.push("f");

var i:int;
for (i = 0; i < (myArray.length); i++) {
  trace(myArray[i]);
}

Didn''t that look easy? and it is, this will output all letters from a to f.

The final thing I want to show you with simple arrays is how to remove an item from an array list.

myArray.splice(0, 1);

You might think its just as using the push method, but with removing we have the opportunity to remove a row of items at once, say we want to remove the first 3 items it would be.

myArray.splice(0, 2);

I could go on and on and on about using arrays to loop through and do a lot of stuff, and I assure you, I will do some more in depth lessons on that, but an article must have a limit of size, so for a complete list of methods for the array I can only recommend Adobe''s own livedocs its some dry reading, but its good for quick reference.

Append text with AS3

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 08:23:00 EST

Okay its been a while since I have made articles for actionscript, mostly because of some freelance work that has taken a lot of my time lately, so we will be starting off light with a simple function to add text to a textbox using the appendtext.

Yes I know it sounds simple, and it is, but some newbies sometimes mess up the most simple stuff, so I want to make this stuff clear.

An example of a bad way to append text to a textbox (or just to a variable)

var myVariable = "hey"
myVariable = myVariable + "there"

Which outputs hey there, BUT I will recommend you doing it another way.

First this is what we will be making.

The method we will use is called appendText, but first we need to set up a button and some textboxes, and give them instance names.

First make the three buttons as shown in the example above, give them the following instance names. "appendBreakBtn" "appendBtn" "breakBtn"

Now make two textboxes, you can just drag them from the component panel, make one of them multline and give them the following instance names. "inputText" and "displayText".

Now we are ready to look at some code.

This first function will just add functionality to the appendBtn button, to add some text into the textbox named displayText.

We add an eventlistener to listen to when somebody clicks the button, then active the function to add the text from the input text field.

appendBtn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, doAppend);
function doAppend(evt:MouseEvent):void {
	displayText.appendText(inputText.text);
}

This next function will be to add a line break, because for some reason this is really weird with textboxes in flash actionscript, what you have to do is to add a /n this is a line break. So let's do that.

breakBtn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, doBreak);
function doBreak(evt:MouseEvent):void {
	displayText.appendText("\n");
}

Finally the last thing we will do is to combine those two functions so after we append some text to the textfield, we will add a linebreak.

appendBreakBtn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, doAppendBreak);
function doAppendBreak(evt:MouseEvent):void {
	displayText.appendText(inputText.text + "\n");
}

As you might see, this is the first step towards making a small chat in flash, so maybe I will make an article about that, and this will be a pre launch of that, who knows.

Disco retro contentbox PSD

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 08:23:00 EST

Check out this new web header or content box graphic I made last night, retro style, dance thingy. I just love working with vector shapes, combining them to make funny and cool designs.

I didnt know what to use this for, so I share it with you guys. You can download the Photoshop file here and use it if you want.

Download the photoshop file:

Size: 314kb
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

0Tutor Announcing Design Makeover

Sat, 27 Sep 2008 08:23:00 EST

So I dicided to make a redesign, not only a redesign, I changed the whole structure of the site, acturlly a great deal of work, but now I hope this will be the final version, with only a few small changes now and then.

So what do you thing of it?

With a new design comes great responsibility, so we are going to make some changes now.

In the future not only will we provide tutorials to our visitors, but also free graphic, icons, and other interesting download resources for webmasters, designers, and everybody else in need.
So keep visiting the 0tutor blog and see what the future will bring.

For now I will use a week or so on implementing my new designs, so keep visiting and see the changes flow.

I would love to get some feedback before I launch my new design (or even after, maybe I will make some changes later on).

Summer sky wallpaper

Tue, 2 Sep 2008 08:23:00 EST

Even though its raining and the summer is over, I still feel like making one more summer wallpaper to my collection. next time I will try to make some winter theme wallpapers instead, or some ice to cool me down a bit.

But for now you may settle for some summer inspired wallpapers and here is the next one in the season.

Here is the wallpaper download info.

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Sunny day wallpaper

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

It has been sunny all day after 7 days of constant rain, damn its nice with some sun, and the temperature has raised quite a bit, so I got inspired to make a wallpaper of a sunny day with some sunrays and green, yellow bright colors.

Hope you like it.

Here is the wallpaper download info.

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Stylish button set giveaway

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

I have really been working lately, I had a customer requesting some buttons for some software interface, so I made a couple of different styles. (Of cause I cant give away the one they paid me for) but I did make a couple of others, and here is one I will share with you for free.

So click here to download my stylish photoshop buttons set, easily editable to change the buttons text and symbols, or even adjust colors and shapes.

Im acturlly really annoid that I cant share with you the buttons they actrually choose, because they are really cool, maybe some day they will let me publish them for you.

But as I said, here are my new buttons set.

Download the photoshop file:

Size: 314kb
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Sleek Green Soda Wallpaper

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

I made this new wallpaper today when I saw some soda advertising in a magazine, I dont even remember what magazine, but I quite like my new colorful wallpaper.

And for the wallpapers specs.

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Army text style with Photoshop

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this Adobe Photoshop tutorial I will show you how to make this great looking army style text effect.

First start by making a green gradient and drag it across the stage, then type in your text, the color does not matter, we will change that later.

I used a font called "stencil" it has kind of a army style look, and looks quite cool with the effect.

Now in the layers panel double click the text layer we just created to get to the layers styles panel, then give it the following settings.

For the last one, the pattern overlay, you will need to create a pattern first or download a photoshop pattern and import it the your photoshop patterns, just do some google search for photoshop stripe pattern and you will find some good free photoshop patterns.

Now we will make the top glossy part of the letters, so hold down ctrl and click the text layer in the layers panel to load the text selection.

Then create a new layer above and name it gloss or something, with a white color use a brush to stroke some glossiness on the letters like I did below.

Now the rest of it is just for show, but I will tell you what I did anyway, just make a copy of all the layers concerning the text, flip it using the edit -> transform -> flip vertical, move it down and bring its opacity down. this will make a mirror reflection of the text.

Retro contact form with CSS

Mon, 11 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

As you might have noticed on my blog, I have been doing a lot of css/html designs lately, well its not like I stopped playing with photoshop, but Im taking a break and trying to motivate myself with other sources.

So what we have been doing today is making a retro styled html contact form like you can see below, you can also download the html source files below.

Size: 314kb
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Now for all of you who also want to learn something here and not only use what I made (even though thats also okay), but here is a small tutorial on how to make this retro styled contact form with html and css styles.

First the retro white box is just one big image, you can download it below, just right click and save on your desktop.

I made it in photoshop, im not going through the steps on how I made it, you can watch some of my photoshop tutorials, and I will promise you, you will learn how to do it.

Now we need two files, an html file to contain all the html code, and a styles sheet file to control most design and sizes etc.

So here is the source code for the html file

And the Css code

body {
background-color:#80d7ff;
font-size:120%;
}
.textbox_outer {
padding-top: 230px; padding-left:150px;
}
.box_wrapper {
background-image:url(imgs/bg.jpg); background-position:center; background-repeat:no-repeat;
width:650px; height:597px; margin:auto; margin-top: 70px;
}
textarea {
font-family: "Lucida Grande",Verdana,sans-serif;
font-size:18px;
border: 1px solid #999999;
width:270px; height:100px;
background-color:#80d7ff;
overflow: auto;
}
input {
font-family: "Lucida Grande",Verdana,sans-serif;
font-size:18px;
border: 1px solid #999999;
}
input.textboxes {
width:270px;
background-color:#80d7ff; 
}
input.btn {
color:#ff00c0;
border: 1px solid #999999;
}

Save the files, remember to keep the image file in a seperate folder named imgs, and if you can get it to work, try downloading the project file at the top of the post.

Funny cartoon text style

Fri, 8 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this Adobe Photoshop tutorial we will make a funny cartoon text effect, I hope you like it.

First type in the text you want to apply this effect to, remember to use a very bold text, and with some soft edges will also help.

I used a font called "showcard gothic" which gives me a great effect.

Now go to the layers panel and double click the text layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it the following settings.

For the pattern overlay, you will need to create a pattern first or download a photoshop pattern and import it the your photoshop patterns, just do some google search for photoshop stripe pattern and you will find some good free photoshop patterns.

Now we will make the glossy effect at the top of every letter.

Hold down ctrl and click the letters layer in the layers panel to load the shape selection. Then with the elliptical selection tool make sure to choose the selection mode "intersect with selection" and drag a selection as shown below.

Then you should end up with a selection looking like this.

Make a new layer, fill the selection with a white color and bring down its opacity to about 20 percent (maybe less), and we are done.

The final touch I did was to add this whole effect to each letters separately and rotate them to make them look a bit funny.

Green retro wallpaper

Thu, 7 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

I have been very much into retro style stuff lately, so now I made a new wallpaper using some different vector shapes and playing with some colors.

You can download it and use it for free here, but if you want to redistribute it, you may give me a linkback or a thanks note.

Almost forgot.

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Colurful Price Tags Tutorial

Tue, 5 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this Adobe Photoshop tutorial we will make a simple, sleek price tag with nice colors and gradients.

First with Photoshop, open the custom shapes panel and locate the "star shape" like I found below, it should be there by default with photoshop when you bought it.

Now in the layers panel, double click on the new layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it the following settings

Now we will make the price tag glossiness, so create a new layer above the price tag layer and name glossy or something.

Hold down ctrl and click the price tag layer in the layers panel to load the shapes selection.

With the elliptical selection tool, make sure you have the selection mode set to "intersect with selection" and drag as shown below.

Drag a gradient going from white to transparent, inside the selection, as I did below.

Now you can type in whatever price within the price tag shape, between the shape and glossy layers in the layers panel.

Download the photoshop file:

Size: 314kb
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Water bubbles wallpaper

Mon, 4 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

Check out this new wallpaper I just made, as you might already have guessed it some water with bubbles.

I had my morning shower and felt kind of bubbly so I got inspired and made this water bubble wallpaper for you, I think it looks quite good, if you like it, feel free to download it and use it as you want, but just remember if you redistribute it, give me some credit, as for any other wallpapers on my site, but you can read all the in the readme file if you download the wallpaper.

And for the wallpapers specs.

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Poker header Photoshop Tutorial

Fri, 1 Aug 2008 08:23:00 EST

Check out this new poker header graphic I made yesterday, I want to share with you.

You can download the Photoshop file at the bottom, or you can read the tutorial and make one of your own, with your own characteristics.

And here is the tutorial.

First we will make the background, and here we will make some sunray shapes, you can either search google for some sunray photoshop brush or shapes to save time and work.

Or do it the hard way, with the pen tool click and make a triangle spike, copy it a lot of times, place them like I did in the image below..

Now we will change the background color, so select the background layer and make a gradient from light green to dark and with the radial gradient tool drag out from center of the image we are making.

Set the sunray layers blending mode to multiply and your background should look like this.

Now we will be making the poker cards, this is quite simple because Photoshop is give us most of the shapes.

You will repeat these next steps 4 times, one for each card of cause.

So with the rectangle tool drag out a shape for the cards.

Go to photoshop custom shape dropdownbox and locate the 4 card symbols, like a heart, diamond, etc and place them inside each card shape.

In the layers panel select each card separately and with the free transform tool rotate and place them like I did below.

You might also want to resize them to make them fit the image size.

This last part if the our text, so with the text tool type in some text on the stage, still having the text selected, click on the small icon at the top of the photoshop window named "wrap text"

and set it like I did below.

Now your text should look something like this, (your font might not be the same as mine of cause).

The final thing we need to do is to style the text, so in the layers panel, double click on the text layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it settings like below.

Download the photoshop file:

Size: 314kb
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Sunshine and flowers Free Wallpaper

Wed, 30 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

I felt like doing something warm today in this overheated apartment, did I say is just as hot today as it was yesterday.

So while I was feeling warm and and overheated, I made a sunshine inspired wallpaper with flowers and a cute little butterfly, simple minimalistic colors and shapes to make the wallpaper look clean.

So enjoy the wallpaper, and the summer while it last.

And here is some wallpaper download info:

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Pink navbar Photoshop Tutorial

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this Adobe Photoshop tutorial we will make a sleek and stylish web navigation bar, I hope you enjoy it as much as my classmates did.

First we will make the rounded box for the nav bar, so choose the rounded rectangle tool and drag a rectangle on the stage like I did below.

In the layers panel, double click on the shape layer we just made to get to the layers styles panel and give it settings like below.

Now type in some menu text like I did, I typed home, download and links, you can use as many as you want, just change the width of the nav bar to fit how many navigation links you need.

Now we will make a small separator to separate the navigations. Now you might want to zoom in a bit.

These next steps should be done for each space between navigation links so repeat it as many times needed.

With the line tool draw a line straight through the navigation bar as I did below, (remember to do it in a separate layer) then give it a gradient going from light to dark as I did

The last thing we will do is to make the small reflection effect, so just make a copy of the navigation bar shape layer, (the first one we made) name it reflection and in the layers panel, place it at the bottom.

Pad it down to the end of the navigation bar, then go to edit -> transform -> flip vertical and bring its opacity down to about 20 percent.

And we are done. If this sounds a bit confusing you can download the project file here, it might help you understand what I did.

Download the photoshop file:

Size: 314kb
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Crazy abstract circles wallpaper

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Take a look at this new cool wallpaper I made this morning, some crazy circles generated on top of each other, colorful green variants, I have used it for some hours now on my desktop, and I am quite happy with the wallpaper result, hope you will be tool

Here is the wallpaper download info.

Size: 2.25 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Cute pink text style

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this Adobe Photoshop tutorial we will make a cool looking pink text effect.

I actually came up with this effect by accident when playing around with photoshop (like I do with most stuff these days).

First, like always with text effect we need to type in the text we want to add this effect to.

Then go to the layers panel and double click the text layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it the following settings.

And we are done, its just that simple, but still a cool text effect.

Css hightech styled textboxes

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Check out this new css/html textbox I designed for you, I made a it in 8 different gradients and best of it all, it free to download, also I made a small tutorial below on how I made one of them.

Download button

And now for the tutorial, (you can download the whole thing at the bottom of this post).

First we will need to open photoshop, this textbox consist of two images, and of cause some css and html coding.

So first we will make the metallic rounded box behind the textbox.

With the rounded rectangle tool draw a rectangle like below.

Now in the layers panel double click the new shape layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it settings as below.

Thats it, now we will make the colorful textbox.

First we need to figure out the height of the textbox we will make, mine is 35 px, then make a rectangle on the stage at 35 px height, the width does not matter, we will only use part of it and repeat it.

Now in the layers panel double click the new shape layer to get to the layers styles panel and give it settings as below.

Now the last setting image, where you have to pick a pattern, just do a search on google for photoshop patterns and import one, or make a simple on like I did.

Save the two images, I called the metallic box "bg.jpg" and the colored box "lime.jpg".

Now we are ready to do some simple coding.

Here is the code for the html fil.

And here is the code for the CSS file.

input { 
border: 1px solid #fff;
color: #525252;
font-weight: bold;
font-family: "Lucida Grande",Verdana,sans-serif;
font-size:24px;
height: 30px;
width: 300px;
padding-left: 5px; padding-top:4px;
margin-top: 20px; margin-left: 20px;
text-decoration: none; }

input.lime {
background: url(imgs/lime.jpg) #ffffff repeat-x left center; }

.box_wrapper {
width: 350px; height: 75px;
background: url(imgs/bg.jpg); }

And now we are done, I hope you like my new css based textboxes.

Download my new stylish css designed textboxes here.

Download button

Make a realistic smoke animation

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this flash animation tutorial we will try to create some realistic smoke, and make it act like real smoke.

First find some image with some fire, a match or a chimney or something that could produce smoke, then add that image as a background on the stage. you could lock the layer so you dont change anything later.

Now we will create the smoke, so first, select a light gray color, then with the brush tool start drawing a funny cloudy shape like shown below.

Right click and choose convert to movie clip, then go to the filters panel and give it a blur filter like I did.

You might also want to bring down its opacity (alpha) a bit to make it a bit see through.

Now make yet another smoke movie clip just like we did before. Just because its good to have variation, and all smoke doesnt look the same.

Now we are ready to do some animation to the smoke.

Put each smoke movie clip in each own layer in the layers panel, you can even name the layers smoke 1 and 2.

Now place both smoke effects at its start position (the tip of the fire flame), then create a new keyframe in the timeline at frame 25, drag the smoke up at the top where its going to stop. This should be done for both smoke movie clips.

Now select frame 25 and select the smoke movie clip, then set its alpha to 0. in the timeline for both smoke layers, right click between frame 1 and 25, choose motion tween.

In the timeline for smoke 2 layer, select all frames from 1 to 25, drag them out to start at about frame 12, so now the smoke 2 should first begin when smoke 1 is halfway up.

And we are done, you can make a couple of more smoke movie clips and animate them to make more variations like I did in the example at the top.

Jumping in blue wallpaper

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Check out this new wallpaper I just made, acturlly this is my first wallpaper, so Im still trying to figure out which sizes I should release it in, for now I made one "normal" and one widescreen version, if you have any request of other resolutions just post a comment or something.

So here is my new wallpaper, I called it jumping in blue, It makes me think of dreaming, jumping in the sky and all that, hope you like my wallpaper.

Size: 1.5 mb
Resolutions: 1280x1024 and 1440x900
Format: Photoshop psd file.

Download button

Mp3 player with volume slider using Actionscript 3

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Hi guys, im back with a new flash actionscript 3.0 tutorial, this time we will be making a mp3 player with a volume slider, I must admit, I tried making one some month ago, it didnt work out that well, but I promis you, this works great so just follow along or download the source code at the bottom.

Before we get all excited and start working with actionscript, first we need to do some preperations, make a few buttons and graphics to make our mp3 player look good. So try to follow along, you can make your own graphic buttons, so I wont guide you through how I made mine, only the structure.

So on the visual part, lets make a play, pause and stop button, convert them all into movie clips and give them the following instance names by going to the properties panel. play_btn, pause_btn and stop_btn.

Now we need to make the volume slider, the volume slider consist of a stroke 100 px wide, (its important that its excacly 100 px). Convert it into a movie clip and name it volume_mc. Inside this volume slider movie clip make a handle graphic, convert it into a movie clip and name it mySlider_mc, and place it at the right end of the stroke like below.

Now we are ready to do some actionscript, so go to the main stage and hit f9 or what ever you do to open up the actionscript panel.

To make things easier for both you and me I commented the code inline with the actionscripting, so everything should be explained line by line, and you should be able to copy and past the code directly into your own project.

And here is the source code:

//attatch/import the music file.
var musicPiece:Sound = new Sound(new URLRequest _ 
("http://blog.0tutor.com/JeffWofford_Trouble.mp3"));

// Make a sound channel to change sound configurations.
var mySoundChannel:SoundChannel;

// This variable is checking if the music is playing
var isPlaying:Boolean = false;

// to remember the position of the music playing when we pause, _ 
to start at the same place


var pos:Number = 0;

// First button we will make is a play button, add an eventlistener.
play_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, play_);

function play_(event:Event):void {
//Check if the music is NOT playing, then make it start.
if (!isPlaying) {
mySoundChannel = musicPiece.play(pos);
isPlaying = true;
}
}

// The pause button, here we will use the pos variable we made earlier.
pause_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, pause_);

function pause_(event:Event):void {
// if the music is player, save the current time and stop the playing.
if (isPlaying) {
pos = mySoundChannel.position;
mySoundChannel.stop();
isPlaying = false;
}
}

// Now the final button is the stop button, allmost thet same as pause
stop_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, stop_);

function stop_(event:Event):void {
// First we check if there is anything to stop then make it stop, and reset the pos variable to 0 (start time)
if (mySoundChannel != null) {
mySoundChannel.stop();
pos = 0;
isPlaying = false;
}
}

// this is a bit complicated, but I will try to explain anyway.
// first we make a rectangle and set its width to 100.
var rectangle:Rectangle = new Rectangle(0,0,100,0);

// then we need a varible to check if the handle is being dragged.
var dragging:Boolean = false;

// the eventlistener for startdragging
volume_mc.mySlider_mc.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, startDragging);
function startDragging(event:Event):void {

// here we tell flash the margin on where it should be able to drag, (remember 100 pixels back and forth)
volume_mc.mySlider_mc.startDrag(false,rectangle);
dragging = true;

// This is very important, an eventlistener so we can change the volume, not only make it look good.
volume_mc.mySlider_mc.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, adjustVolume);
}

// well here is the adjust volume function, its not that complicated
function adjustVolume(event:Event):void {

// we make a variable to calculate the volume from the slider handle position and divide it by 100
var myVol:Number = volume_mc.mySlider_mc.x / 100;
// then we set it with the mySoundTransform
var mySoundTransform:SoundTransform = new SoundTransform(myVol);
if (mySoundChannel != null) {
mySoundChannel.soundTransform = mySoundTransform;
}
}

// and of cause the stop draggin function, I dont feel the need to explain it.
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, stopDragging);
function stopDragging(event:Event):void {
if (dragging) {
dragging = false;
volume_mc.mySlider_mc.stopDrag();
}
}

Yah I know that was a lot of code, and it might look a bit confusing, but I promis you, if you try to put it into your own flash file, maybe event delete the comments I made, you will see kind of a paddern, how and why stuff works and how you made a simple mp3 player with actionscript 3.0 :-)

Best of luck to you all.

Pink login form using CSS

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Check out this login html form I made a couple of days ago, I just played around with photoshop and got inspired to make this login from with html/css styles.

Download the login project here.

Download button

And if you really want to go in dept and do it all your self, here is a small tutorial on how I made this html/css styled login page.

First the retro white box is just one big image, you can download it below, just right click and save on your desktop.

Now we just need to make two files an html page and a style sheet file, and put in the code from below.

And remember to put the retro style box inside a folder called imgs.

The source code for the html file: (site.html)



    CSS styled Login form --> by 0Tutor.com
    


    
        
            
            Login Form
            
                Name:
            
            
            
                Password:

The source code for the style sheet file. (style.css)

body {
background-color:#ff00c0;
font-size:120%;
}

div.wrap {
height:100%
width:100%
}

h3 {
color:#ff00c0; font-size:22px
}

.textbox_outer {
padding-top: 43px; padding-left:150px;
}

.box_wrapper {
background-image:url(imgs/bg.jpg); background-position:center; background-repeat:no-repeat;
width:600px; height:360px; margin:auto; margin-top: 70px;
}

input {
font-family: "Lucida Grande",Verdana,sans-serif;
font-size:18px;
border: 1px solid #999999;
}

input.textboxes {
width:270px;
background-color:#ff00c0;
}

input.btn {
color:#ff00c0;
border: 1px solid #999999;
}

div.labels {
width:100px;
color:#ff00c0;
}

Save your work and you are done..

Growing cloud engine with actionscript 3

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Hi I have been playing a lot with different ways to produce smoke and clouds these days, both on frame by frame animations and like actionscript engines.

So here I just made a simple growing cloud particle system with flash actionscript 3.0, and Im going to explain to you how you can make your own animated clouds with flash.

First we need to make one movie clip containing a cloud graphic, to work with, its quite simple just use the brush tool and draw a shape like I did below.

Right click and convert it into a movie clip, then go to the filters panel and add a blur filter with these settings

Now we need to give this cloud an instance name, I named mine cloud_mc.

That we all the particle stuff, now we need only need the technical stuff, by that I mean the actionscript coding, so open up your actionscript panel and past this code into it.

The growing speed variable

var yspeed:Number = (Math.random() * 0.8);

Here we set the clouds start properties such as position, rotation start and alpha.

setCloudProperties();
function setCloudProperties():void {
    cloud_mc.alpha = 100;
    cloud_mc.x = 141;
    cloud_mc.y = 180;
    cloud_mc.rotation = Math.random() *360;
}
// An eventlistener to make the cloud grow. (remember to set this outside the function).
cloud_mc.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, doCloud);

This is all it take to make the cloud engine work and generate some random shape and growth and rotations.

function doCloud(event:Event):void {
    cloud_mc.alpha -= 0.3;
    if (cloud_mc.alpha<50) {
    cloud_mc.alpha -= 0.4;
}

if (cloud_mc.alpha<1) {
	setCloudProperties();
}
	cloud_mc.y = cloud_mc.y - yspeed;
}

Just think of the endless possibilities with such simple code to generate a random cloud growth.

Creating spotlight effect with Photoshop

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this fairly simple tutorial we will learn how to create spotlight effect with adobe photoshop, and how to apply them to objects and backgrounds.

Okay first we need some nice background for this effect to work, I just made a simple dark blue gradients, because I like blue.

Now you can import an object if you want some spotlights hitting an object, I just found a logo I have made for a website redesign not so long ago.

Note: its quite important to use a dark background, as it makes the effect work better.

Now to apply a spotlight effect, you have to have a layer to apply it onto, so we need to merge the object and background layer into one layer to apply this spotlight effect.

So in the layers panel select the object layer and right click, now choose merge down, and you should only have one layer left.

Now finally we are ready to apply the spotlight effects, so go to filters -> render -> lights and effects, and give it settings as shown below.

To make more then one spotlights in the lights panel, hold down the ALT key and drag the light source to the other corner.

Now we can add some extra bling stars with a custom brush tool.

Enemy following me actionscript

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Okay I yesterday I was doing some actionscripting to make a game, (cant reveal it yet though because its not my own, I was just hired to make some parts of it). But I would like to share some of the code with you, like the source code I share today.

This flash actionscript source code is to make an enemy follow your mouse, and some of the great things to notice is that it not only follows that mouse path, it also rotates so its front view is always facing the mouse, thats pretty cool.

So first we need to do some small preparations like creating our enemy, Im going to let this up to you, do whatever you want. When you are done, right click and convert it to a movieclip and give it an instance name, I named mine "enemy_mc"

Now we are ready to do some actionscripting, but remember this is for actionscript 3.0, for it to work with previous versions you will need to do some changes and Im not doing it for you. :-)

You can just copy and past the code into your flash actionscript panel, or you can try reading the comments.

The actionscript source code:

First an eventlistener to call the function to make the enemy move, this is an enterframe event.

enemy_mc.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, do_stuff);

The function we call

function do_stuff(event:Event):void {
    // here we do some calculations to make the ememy rotate based on the mouse angle, centered to the ememy.
    var myRadians:Number = Math.atan2(mouseY-enemy_mc.y, mouseX-enemy_mc.x);
    var myDegrees:Number = Math.round((myRadians*180/Math.PI));
    
    // this is the stuff making the enmy move towards the mouse.
    var yChange:Number = Math.round(mouseY-enemy_mc.y);
    var xChange:Number = Math.round(mouseX-enemy_mc.x);
    var yMove:Number = Math.round(yChange/20);
    var xMove:Number = Math.round(xChange/20);
    
    // Nothing will work without using all this previous calculations, so we set the x and y axis and the rotation.
    enemy_mc.y += yMove;
    enemy_mc.x += xMove;
    enemy_mc.rotation = myDegrees+90;
}

Cameron Dias blurry glass mask effect

Tue, 8 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this flash tutorial we will make a great masking effect and apply it to an image of Cameron Dias, just have a look at the final result below.

So lets get started, first import an image of Cameron Dias to the stage, Now make a new layer on in the layers panel and copy the image of Cameron Dias so now we have to layers.

With the top layer selected, select and convert the image of Cameron Dias to a movie clip, then go to the filters panel and give it a blur filter as shown below.

Now make one last layer above the two other layers we have made, in this layer draw a big black circle, convert it into a movie clip and give it an instance name, I named mine "mouse_mask".

Now we just need to type in a few actionscript lines, so just copy and past these lines into the actionscript panel on the main stage.

Mouse.hide();
addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, enterFrameHandler);

// function to make the circle follow the mouse
function enterFrameHandler(event:Event):void {
    mouse_mask.x = mouseX;
    mouse_mask.y = mouseY;
}

Flash components the ComboBox

Mon, 7 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this next tutorial series we will learn to make use of all the flash components such as simple buttons and combo boxes, checkboxes and data grid, so this is going to be a quite large tutorial, and I will break it up into sections, as we go through all the components.

In this lesson we will learn to use buttons component to raise click events, and I will introduce the combo box, or the drooped as some calls it, and all is of cause done with flash actionscript 3.0.

And here is what we will be making.

First we will make the combo box switch the box color from blue to green when we select a combo box item. Meaning that we will raise an event on the combo box event change.

Next we will learn to add a new item to the combo box, so you can write something into the textbox and with the button you can raise an event to add an item to the combo box.

Before we to down and dirty with the actionscript coding, we need to do some preparations, like setting up some movieclip graphics, buttons etc.

So as you can see by the final result at the top, locate the component panel in flash, (you can find it by going to the top menu -> view -> components) and drag out a button, a textbox and a combobox.

Select each component and go to the properties panel and give them instance names, I named the button "my_btn", the textbox "my_input" and the combobox "my_ComboBox".

Now we will add two items to the combo box, two data elements containing a label name, blue and green.

So select the combo box and locate the parameters panel (by default its docked next to the properties panel).

Click on the dataprovider and add in the information as I did in the image below.

The last thing we need is the colored box, with the rectangle tool draw a square on the stage with the blue color.

Select it and convert the graphic into a movieclip, give the movieclip an instance name, I named mine "box_mc".

In that movie clip create a new keyframe at frame 2 and change the box color to green.

Stay inside the colored box movieclip, now we are ready to do our first actionscripting, even though its just one short line.

Select frame one (the one with a blue box).

In the actionscript panel write:

stop();

Now go back to the main stage and select the first (and only) frame on the stage, then bring up the actionscript panel, now we will do some coding, I have broken the code up into small pieces for better understanding, and wrote some comments inside the code so you can follow along.

//This line is just to style the textbox so it has a border.
my_input.border = true;
//Here we add an eventlistener to the combobox, to call a function if the combo box item changes.
my_ComboBox.addEventListener(Event.CHANGE, changeColor);
function changeColor(event:Event):void {
    //just a couple of traces to show you a couple of information on the current combo box items.
    trace(my_ComboBox.selectedIndex);
    trace(my_ComboBox.selectedItem.label);
    //an if statement telling flash if the combo box label blue is selected then the box movieclip should change the frame to 1.
    if (my_ComboBox.selectedItem.label == "Blue") {
        trace("is blue");
        box_mc.gotoAndStop(1)
        //an if statement telling flash if the combobox label green is selected then the box movieclip should change the frame to 2
    } else if (my_ComboBox.selectedItem.label == "Green") {
        trace("is green");
        box_mc.gotoAndStop(2)
    }
}

Now that we how we worked with the combo box, how to call a function when we select another item from the dropdown list, and used it to make some changes on the stage.

Now just for fun I added a small function where you can add your own items to the combo box.

// first and eventlistener to listen to when someone click the button, then it calls a function.
my_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, addToCombo);

// this is the function, the function basically adds an item to the combo box, containing the my_input text from the textbox.
function addToCombo(event:Event):void {
my_ComboBox.addItem({label:my_input.text});
}

Bouncing soccer ball with actionscript

Fri, 4 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

Hi all, well im not really sure what you can use this effect to, I just played around with flash for a while, and found a very easy way to make it look like a ball is bouncing back in space as a ball would on a floor.

So using actionscript we will do some simple transition tweens to make this effect, remember its made with actionscript 3.0, and will not work with previous versions of flash.

Hover the mouse cursor over the soccer ball to see the bouncing effect.

So before we do any coding we just need to do some simple preparations.

So we need to make a ball, I did it quite easy, just found an image of a ball. Now you need to convert it into a movieclip and give it an instance name, I named mine ball_mc.

Now we are ready to do some actionscripting, I will try to explain line by line what Im doing with the actionscript code, some might seem a bit confusing, but its actually quite simple, and contains few lines of code.

// We will need to import some transition class to handle the tween effects.
import fl.transitions.*;
import fl.transitions.easing.*;

// Now we add some event listeners, to listen if the mouse is hovering the ball, if it is, then we call the function doMouseOver
ball_mc.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_OVER, doMouseOver);
ball_mc.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_OUT, doMouseOut);

// This is the actual function to scale out the ball and make it look like it getting closer to you.
function doMouseOver(event:MouseEvent):void {
    // we define a tween to scale on the x and y axis, make it bounce.easeOut, which actually makes it act like a ball.
    // also the number 1 is the size its scaled to, and 2 is the number of seconds the tween will happen in.
    var xT:Tween = new Tween(ball_mc, "scaleX", Bounce.easeOut, ball_mc.scaleX, 1, 2, true);
    var yT:Tween = new Tween(ball_mc, "scaleY", Bounce.easeOut, ball_mc.scaleY, 1, 2, true);
}

// this function do exactly the same as the one above, just scales it down, to make it look like its going away from you.
// and this event accrues when the mouse is no over the ball.
function doMouseOut(event:MouseEvent):void {
    var xT:Tween = new Tween(ball_mc, "scaleX", Bounce.easeOut, ball_mc.scaleX, .5, 2, true);
    var yT:Tween = new Tween(ball_mc, "scaleY", Bounce.easeOut, ball_mc.scaleY, .5, 2, true);
}

Drawing crazy lines with actionscript

Thu, 3 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this flash actionscript tutorial we will play a bit more with the drawing api, this time we will apply some randomness to the drawing, so we will draw a line then will continue drawing by it self, using some random calculations.

You can see here what I came up with, and yes this is not really a graph for anything, its not my heart rhythm or anything, I just used the random math class and made up my own small math formula.

Now this is only a coding tutorial, so you will have no need to do anything with drawing, and making movie clips or anything, just jump right into the actionscript panel and start programming.

To make it easier to understand I have tried line by line to explain the code, you can see the code description inside the code, or you can just copy and paste the code into your own flash project and play around with it.

First we set a few variables, first two defines the start position of the line.

var oldX:Number = 30;
var oldY:Number = 150;
var randomX:Number;
var randomY:Number;

Now we define the line style we will draw with. 2 px thick and black color.

this.graphics.lineStyle(3,0x00BB00);

The start position

this.graphics.moveTo(oldX,oldY);
// now we add an eventlistener to draw the line, its an enterframe event, so it keeps repeating 12 frames per sec.
this.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, drawRandom);

And here is the actural function.

function drawRandom(event:Event):void {
    // this is the small calculations to tell flash what the line should draw, you can change it a round do more simple or more complicated calculations.
    randomX = oldX + Math.random() * 3;
    randomY = 50 + Math.tan(oldY + Math.random() * 3);
    
    // and here we set it to draw the line, (finally).
    this.graphics.lineTo(randomX,randomY);
    oldX = randomX;
    oldY = randomY;
}

Draw a smiley face shape with actionscript 3.0

Tue, 1 Jul 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this actionscript 3.0 tutorial we will be playing with the drawing api, so you can learn to draw by coding strokes and fills to make a simple but cute smiley graphic, just have a look at the final result below.

In this tutorial we dont need to do anything on the stage, so just jump right into the actionscript panel.

Now you need to remember in which order we type in the code to draw lines and fills, so we dont need to change the depth of the graphics, just to make things easier.

So here comes the actionscript source code.

First we refer to this, as in the stage, so we will draw graphics on the stage and set the line style
a black with a 2 px thick line.

this.graphics.lineStyle(2,0x000000);

Draw circle, this is the outer of the head shape, and we give it a yellow fill, because it is a smiley.

this.graphics.beginFill(0xf0ff00);

We specify a x and y position for the circle and a radius to tell how big it should be.

this.graphics.drawCircle(200,180,140);

Now we tell flash to stop drawing and find a starting point to draw a line.

this.graphics.moveTo(100,200);
this.graphics.lineTo(150,250);

Create a curve and then another line for the mouth part of the smiley.

this.graphics.curveTo(200,300,250,250);
this.graphics.lineTo(300,200);

Draw two filled (black) circles for the eyes to finish up our smiley face.

this.graphics.beginFill(0x000000);
this.graphics.drawCircle(250,100,20);
this.graphics.drawCircle(150,100,20);
this.graphics.endFill();

I hope this was easy to understand, I broke it up into small pieces to make it more simple for you.

Cellphone vibrator with actionscript 3

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 08:23:00 EST

In this flash actionscript and animation tutorial we will make a cellphone vibrate using actionscript and some simple calculations and random values.

And this is how the vibrating phone will look.

First we need to import an image of a cellphone, it can just be a jpg or any other supported image files, you can use photoshop or your favorite image manipulations software to cut away background as I did.

Now when you have imported the phone image to the stage, right click it, and convert it to a movie clip.

In the properties panel give it an instance name, I named mine "phone_mc".

Now we are ready to do the simple actionscript code for this animation effect, I have made some inline code descriptions for you to better understand the code.

You can just copy and paste the code into your own flash project and it should work.

// first we define the current positions of the phone, both x and y axis.
var posx:Number = phone_mc.x;
var posy:Number = phone_mc.y;

// here we make an eventlistenser to call the shake function with an enter frame event.
phone_mc.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, shakeIt);

// here is the shake function
function shakeIt(event:Event):void {
// quite simple just changes the current phone position and takes a random number (7/8) to add to it.
phone_mc.x = posx+(Math.floor(Math.random()*7));
phone_mc.y = posy+(Math.floor(Math.random()*8));
// also a random rotation to make it more interesting.
phone_mc.rotation = Math.random()*10;
}

Particle snow weather with actionscript

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 08:23:00 EST

I did it again, yet another simple particle system, this time I will show you how simple it is to make snow fall from the sky and look nice.

First we need to create the snow ball movie clip, so create a new movie clip, and within it, draw a small white circle, right click and convert it into a movie clip.

Now go to the filters panel and add these two filters as shown below.

Now go back to the main frame, you can add a background of a city or something to make this effect look even more nice.

Now this part may seem a bit odd if you havent worked much with actionscript and movieclips before, so just follow along.

In the library locate the snow ball movie clip we just made, right click and choose linkage, then type in Show and check the export to actionscript checkbox like I did below.

Hit ok, and flash might give you something that looks like an error, but its not, it just tells you that it will create a class for the movie clip, and thats okay.

Now we are ready to do some actionscript coding to make this falling snow particle effect work.

I tried to explain the code as detailed as possible, without making it look to overfilled.

You can see the code description inside the code, or you can just copy and paste the code into your own flash project and play around with it.

Just some variables we define for later use.

var snow_mcsArray:Array = new Array();
var speedX:Number;
var speedY:Number;

Loops through and makes 20 snow balls that we position and add properties randomly to.

for (var i=0; i < 20; i++) {
    var snow_mc:Snow = new Snow();
    
    //Give random x and y speed to the snow_mc.
    snow_mc.speedX = Math.random();
    snow_mc.speedY = 4 + Math.random();
    snow_mc.alpha = 0.3 + Math.random() * 0.8;
    
    // just making the snow balls smaller, I thought I made them too big.
    snow_mc.scaleX = .4;
    snow_mc.scaleY = .4;
    //Set the starting position
    snow_mc.y = Math.random() * stage.stageHeight;
    snow_mc.x = Math.random() * stage.stageWidth;
    
    //Add the snow_mc to the stage and add it the the array
    addChild(snow_mc);
    snow_mcsArray.push(snow_mc);
}

Add an eventlistener to the enterframe event, to make the snow fall repeatly

stage.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, makeSnow);

function makeSnow(event:Event):void {
    //Loop through the snow_mcs
    for (var i = 0; i < snow_mcsArray.length; i++) {
        var snow_mc = snow_mcsArray[i];
        snow_mc.x += snow_mc.speedX;
        snow_mc.y += snow_mc.speedY;
        // makes the snow start over from the top, when it hits the bottom.
        if (snow_mc.y > stage.stageHeight) {
        	snow_mc.y = 0;
        }
    }
}

Make a blood stain wallpaper

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 08:23:00 EST

Okay this tutorial is going to be much about freehand, you might not be able to do exactly what I do, maybe you cant find the exact same brushes as I do, maybe you just want to do it a bit different, but I will try to guide you through how to make a great look blood stain wallpaper with adobe photoshop.

First we will need to make a gradient to lay as a background on the stage, I just made a simple light blue metallic looking gradient and dragged it across the stage.

Now go to brushes.deviantart.com and find some cool looking blood stain photoshop brushes, (could also be called splatter brushes). When you have collected a small bunch of them, just open them in photoshop to add them to the brush panel.

Now we are ready to draw, select a dark red color and with the different blood stain brushes draw some stains.

not too main with the same brush size and color, change the color to a different red and then change brush size and brush style, its all about variation.

And we are done, remember the keywords, variation, variation, and variation, and maybe even some simplicity, dont overdue it so it looks to filled.