Creating a Natural Effect Cast Member

Using Intel® Web Design Effects (WDE) Natural Effect in Macromedia® Director®, you can:

Create and insert a stand-alone natural effect such as clouds or a sunrise into your cast, or
Apply an effect to a bitmap cast member and insert the result into your cast. In this case, you should first prepare a masked area in the bitmap to receive the natural effect, and import the bitmap into your cast.

Click the topic that matches what you want to do: 

Insert a stand-alone Natural Effect
Prepare a bitmap image to receive a Natural Effect
Import a bitmap cast member
Apply a Natural Effect to a bitmap cast member

To insert a stand-alone Natural Effect:

1 Choose Insert > Intel Web Design Effects > Natural Effect.
Director opens the Natural Web Design Effects Properties Editor dialog box. Light Clouds, the default natural effect, is already selected and appears in the small preview window.

2 Select the type of effect you want from among the 16 choices in the dialog box.
As you select an effect, it appears in the preview window.
3 If you want to blend the effect with the background color, check the appropriate box.
4 Click OK.
The selected effect is inserted as a cast member into the current frame of your cast. This tiny icon represents the new cast member.

5 Drag the cast member icon onto the stage (or into the score) to make it a sprite. The following sprite would appear if you selected the default, Light Clouds, without background blending.
Tip: If you want to add a bitmap to the effect later, double click on the sprite and apply the effect to a bitmap cast member.

To prepare a bitmap image to receive a Natural Effect:

When preparing a bitmap to receive a natural effect, keep these points in mind:

If you want to apply a natural effect to text in Macromedia Director, create your text string in the Director Paint* window, not in the Director Text window. The Paint window saves text images as bitmaps that are supported by Intel WDE Xtras. You can alter the font, style, and size of the text by right-clicking on it within the Paint window.
If you want to apply a natural effect to an image, use the built-in Paint program in Director or a similar image editing program to apply a single color (called a mask color) to the area you want to receive the natural effect. For example, if you plan to use a fog or waterfall effect, make all the sky area pixels one color, preferably one that contrasts with the other colors in the illustration or photo:
  1. Determine where in the image you want the natural effect to appear.

  2. Open an image editing program, such as Director's Paint.

  3. Select a color that is unique and contrasting; it is best if the RGB value of the mask color does not appear anywhere else in the image and is easy to pick out as the mask color.

  4. Apply this mask color to the area(s) of the image where the natural effect should appear.

  5. Save the image. Use this image in your cast.

To import a bitmap cast member:

1 Choose File > Import, OR
Right click inside an empty frame in your internal cast and choose Import.
You'll see the Import Files into "Internal" dialog box.

2 Choose the image(s) you wish to include as cast member(s), choose a color depth option, and click OK. The cast member bitmap(s) appear in one or more frames in the internal cast.
Note: Images with alpha channel effects (transparency) are 32-bits. If you reduce the color depth, Director removes all the alpha channel data.

To apply a Natural Effect to a bitmap cast member:

Before starting, make sure that you have prepared the cast member(s) you want to use in a natural effect and that they are imported/stored in a cast linked to the movie. See Requirements for Natural Effect for details about types of bitmaps that can receive natural effects.

1 Choose Insert > Intel Web Design Effects > Natural Effect, OR
Right click on a natural effect sprite on the stage (if one is present) and choose Edit Cast Member.
Director opens the Natural Web Design Effects Properties Editor dialog box.
2 Select the type of effect you want from among the 16 choices in the dialog box.
As you select an effect, it appears in the preview window.
3 If you want to blend the effect with the background color, check the appropriate box.
4 If necessary, use the < and > buttons to move through the Cast window until you find the bitmap you want to use with the effect. (Note that you can view members of both internal and external casts, if present.)
As you click the buttons, a thumbnail of each cast member displays.
You can also type a cast member number in the box below the image and press Tab; Director will select that number or the closest cast member to it.
5 Choose the cast member you want by clicking the Select-> button. The image displays in the larger window, where the effect appears superimposed on the current mask color of the image.
6 If necessary, use the slider or arrow buttons to switch to the correct mask color that you wish to paint over, or mask, with the natural effect. (This should be the mask color that you prepared earlier with an image editing program.)
The most dominant color in the image will appear leftmost in the slider and will display the highest percentage of color.

7 When you are satisfied with the result, click OK.
The result is inserted as a cast member into the current frame of your cast. The icon shown in frame 2 represents the new cast member.

8 Drag the cast member icon from your cast onto the stage (or score) to make it a sprite:
Tips: You can position and scale the sprite as needed. The effect animates when the movie is played; see Using Natural Effect in a Director movie.
To change the effect type or bitmap image, double click on the sprite to bring up the Natural Web Design Effects Properties Editor dialog box, and make your changes.

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