Now that you know about the
formats and tools, it's time to get to work. Here are the basic steps to follow
when building an animation:
Prepare your images, either in
a separate graphics package or your animation tool if it supports image
editing. If possible, try to keep the size of the images to a minimum.
Plan the animation. Think about
how the image will change, how many frames to use (or how many seconds it will
run), and where the animation will appear on the Web page. If you want your
animation to attract attention, don't put it at the bottom of a long page. And
don't have the animation run for more than 10 to 15 seconds. You have about
that long to catch viewers.
Build the animation in your
tool of choice. While working on the animation, adjust the timing of the clip
so that the transitions appear smooth. Most tools let you do preview the
animation while working.
Adding the Animation to a Page
This is the easy part. All you
have to do is insert some HTML code into your Web page. The tags you use will
depend on the type of animation you've created. While most applications
generate the necessary code, you may need to edit or copy the code to another
page. Knowing what tags to look for and how they work will come in handy.
Putting an animated GIF, PNG,
or MNG your page involves the same HTML tags as adding a static image. Use the
<img /> tag like this:
If you need to resize the
image, use the HEIGHT and WIDTH attributes. Remember to include the ALT attribute for people
who surf with their graphics turned off, or who use text-only browsers.
Adding Flash files to a page
can be complicated if you decide to do it manually. Fortunately, though, Flash
can generate the necessary HTML. All you have to do it copy the HTML into your
Web page and make sure that the Flash file (which has the extension .swf) is in
proper directory on your Web server.
Conclusion
Building Web animation is a relatively simple, though
time consuming process. But if you want to kick things up a notch on your Web
pages, it's time well spent.