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SWiSH Max: Ray of light |
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This tutorial will show you an easy way to create the “Ray of Light” effect.
Assumed Knowledge: Basic Drawing and Reshaping in SWiSH.
Getting Started
Before beginning, take a look at the layout. Notice that the light is behind
the center letter, and that the further the rays are from the light the wider
and shorter they become; also notice that the letter in front of the light has
rays extending from both sides of it. In this example there are an odd number
of letters in the word, leaving two pairs of letters of equal distance from the
light. If the word(s) you choose has an even number of letters, you will need
to take this into account when pairing the letters off; leaving either the
first or the last letter unpaired.
This effect can be achieved fairly easily in SWiSH. Reshaping the rays is the
most time consuming task in creating this effect. For this tutorial, you may
find it easier if you choose a word(s) that has letters with few curves, and
choose a sans serif font (such as Arial) using upper case letters.
Creating the Rays
1. Begin by making the movie’s background black. Create your word or words
using white text.
2. After you have created your text, draw a line and center it horizontally
across the text. This guide will help you keep the rays centered.
Determine where the light source will be coming from.
3. Create a rectangle to use as the ray for the first letter, making it between
1 ˝ and 2 times the height of the letter (the more letters you have in your
word(s) the shorter the height of the outside rays) and at least 4 times its
width.
4. From the Shape Panel, choose a solid line in a color that will be easy to
see over the text and against the background, and choose none for the fill.
5. Place your rectangle over the letter so that the right side of it completely
covers the right side of the letter. Drag to adjust the dimensions, and center
horizontally over the line.
6. Make a copy of this shape, paste and place over the last letter, covering
the left side of this letter. Center it horizontally.
Reshaping the Rays
7. Select the rectangle over the first letter, and from the toolbar, select the
reshape tool. Drag the top right corner point of the rectangle to the select
the rectangle over the first letter, and from the tool bar, select the reshape
tool. Drag the bottom right corner of the rectangle over to the bottom right
corner of the letter. Right click and insert anchors as needed, dragging each
anchor to a point on the right side of the letter, such that the right side of
the rectangle conforms to the shape of the right side of the letter.
8. When you have completed shaping this ray, reshape the rectangle over the
last letter conforming the left side of its shape to the left side of the
letter's.
9. Create a rectangle for the second letter, making this rectangle taller and
narrower than the rectangle for the first and last letters.
10. Copy and paste for its corresponding letter, and reshape these.
11. Continue creating, centering, and reshaping rectangles, until you reach the
center letter.
12. When you are shaping the rays for the center letter, conform the rectangle
for the left ray to the letter's left side, and the rectangle for the right ray
the letter's right side.
Adding a Gradient Fill
13. Each ray will have a linear gradient white to white fill.
The edge of the ray that is furthest from the light should be set to 0% white
and the inside edge of the fill to 100% white, as shown in the example. Remove
the solid lines from the ray as you fill them.
14. The center letter will also have radial filled circle about 2 times the
height of the letter. You may choose a white to white or color fill, and you
may add a solid line as one in the example shows. Set the starting alpha value
to 100% and the ending value to 0%.
15. If you would like to add a star/beam as the example shows, create a very
thin radial filled ellipse. set the starting alpha value to 100% and the ending
value to 0%. Copy and paste to create a second ellipse. From the transform
panel, rotate one of these 180°, center and group.
Adding the Effects
Before you apply your effects, you will want to break your text object into
individual letters. The easiest way to do this is to select your text object and
select Modify | Grouping | Group as Shape, and then select Modify | Grouping | Ungroup.
This will break your text into individual letters (actually shapes) so that you can apply
an effect to each one separately.
16. The rays have the Fade Out effect applied to them. In this example, the
movie fps is set to 20, and the duration of each effect is 5 frames.
17. The letters have the Fade In effect applied to them, have a duration of 4
frames, and begin 1 frame after the first frame of the ray effect.
18. The next ray's effect begins one frame after the preceding letter's effect
begins: for example at frame 1, the ray for the first letter fades out, at
frame 2 the first letter fades in, and at frame 3 the ray for the second letter
fades out, etc., until you reach the center ray.
19. Both the right and left rays for the center letter begin at the same frame.
The center letter and the radial filled shape begin at the same frame as well.
the center letter has a duration of 5 frames.
20. The radial filled shape has the Fade Out effect applied to it, with a
duration of 5 frames. One frame after this begins, the star group has a Place
effect applied to it, with the Alpha Value set to 100% transparent, then the
Fade In effect for the duration of 3 frames that is rotated to 90°, followed by
the Remove effect.
You may prefer a slower effect, especially if your word(s) has more letters.
Adjust the duration and spacing of these effects as desired. |
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