LiveMotion is a really powerful program that is not too difficult to learn. That is probably the most important thing that I can say to start with.

I must admit to being biased towards Flash 5 which I have learnt over the last year and find that switching to LiveMotion has been a bit of a struggle. The reason for this is the different way of thinking that has gone into the development of the two programs. Macromedia Flash has been the front-running program for 2D animation for quite some time now, and there were bound to be differences of opinion between it and the foremost graphics manipulation programs which are made by Adobe.

For industry standards the top of the heap has been Adobe's Photoshop for images and Illustrator for vector-based images. There are obviously other programs that have a lot of the same features and have their own groups of afficionados, and I certainly do not wish to upset anyone, as I like Corel products which seem to be as powerful, but not quite as popular. The term "Photoshopping" has come to be synonymous with image manipulation, no matter what program was used.

Now, however, Flash is going to be pushed hard. LiveMotion is Adobe's answer and is looking as though it can definitely be a contender in the growing animation market. This does not only mean 2D animation such as cel animation, but also interactive Web sites which has been the domain of Flash up until now. With this first version of LiveMotion, Adobe has thrown it's hat into the ring in a serious way. LiveMotion integrates fully with Photoshop and Illustrator, and images imported from those programs can be updated in their respective programs and then refreshed in LiveMotion. Very tricky. It saves having to bring up images and re-adjust them, then save them and open them again in LiveMotion which is what has to happen with Flash.

I will have to keep comparing the two programs as they are going for the same market, and acceptance in industry is the holy grail that is being sought. LiveMotion is not as simple as some programs that can be used to create .swf files, but can be understood fairly quickly by complete novices. This is a potentially very powerful tool with much more depth than the programs that just create logos. The main superficial difference between the programs is that Flash is a timeline based program, which means that the timeline is detailed so that you can insert keyframes and then place your object into place, after which you create your tweens. Tweens are the intermediate frames that connect keyframes, which are the significant points of any animation. For cel animation you draw the points of reference (key frames) and the in-between (tween) frames give the smooth blend of animation between them.

Flash can be programmed to insert these tweens on command. LiveMotion on the other hand does the tweening for you when you place an object on the stage, and as it is an object-based program you do most of your work on the stage. By dragging your image around on stage, tweens are automatically inserted between keyframes which are also automatically inserted when you stop moving the object. This only happens if the the object transform drop down menu for that object is opened and the Position clock face is clicked. If you need extra keyframes, move the Current Time Marker Current Time Marker (play head) to where you want it, and just put a tick in the little box that has opened.

The keyframes are shown on the stage as larger dots joined by the tweens which give the impression of an elastic band. When the play head is activated, the object will follow smoothly, the path that has been created.

When adding the keyframes this is not important, but you will need to extend the object timeline to allow the extra keyframes to be added where you want them, and the composition timeline will open up at the same time. The composition timeline can be shortened later if required.

Contined on Page 2 -->

--By Tim Skyrme
http://www.artzend.com