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Tutorial: how to create flash movie using SWF Scout library and Visual Basic



Quick Start Guide: How to create SWF file from Visual Basic: "Hello, World" example 

You can download the source code of this example here: swfscout_vb.zip

This guide will teach you how to create simple SWF flash animation using SWF Scout library and Visual Basic

 
1) Install SWF Scout library on your computer and run Visual Basic. Go to File and click New
 
Visual Basic file menu new command
 
The Project Wizard will appear:
New Visual Basic project wizard
2) Select Standard EXE project type and click Open to create a new project.

Visual Basic will generate new project called Project1 and will automatically open the main form of the generated project:
New project generated by Visual Basic
 
3) Click on Form1 surface and Visual Basic will show the code window for Form_Load event:
Visual Basic form load event code handler auto generated
 
4) Now you have to add the code that will create SWF flash movie file using SWF Scout library. 
 
Here is the source code that you can simply copy and paste into Visual Basic:
 
 W = 640 ' width
 H = 480 ' height
 Set Movie = CreateObject("SWFScout.FlashMovie")
 Movie.InitLibrary "demo", "demo"
 Movie.BeginMovie 0, 0, W, H, 1, 12, 6
 Movie.Compressed = True
 Movie.SetBackgroundColor 255, 255, 255 ' set background color to white
 Dim Font As Integer
 Font = Movie.AddFont("Arial", 18, True, False, False, False, 0) ' add font
 ' create and place text
 Dim Text As Integer
 Text = Movie.AddText("Hello, World!", 0, 0, 0, 255, Font, 0, 100, 250, 160)
 Movie.PlaceText Text, Movie.CurrentMaxDepth ' place text into current depth
 Movie.PLACE_FadeOut 0.5 ' fade out text
 Dim Shape As Integer
 Shape = Movie.AddShape ' add new shape
 Movie.SHAPE_Rectangle 0, 140, 150, 285 ' draw rectangle
 Movie.SHAPE_SetSolidColor 50, 255, 50, True, 255 ' set solid fill for shape
 Movie.PlaceShape Shape, Movie.CurrentMaxDepth ' place shape into current depth
 Movie.ShowFrame 10 ' show 10 frames
 Movie.EndMovie ' end movie generation
 Movie.SaveToFile "c:\Shapes.swf" ' save generated SWF into file
 
This function will create SWF file "Shapes.swf" on drive C:\
 
Hint:
You can simply copy the source code from the snippet above and then paste it in the Visual Basic code editor as it's shown on the screenshot below:
Form load code added
 
5) Press F5 to run the application (you can also use "Run" | "Start" menu command). 
 
Run project button on toolbar
 
6) Visual Basic will run the application and application will generate SWF file "c:\Shapes.swf".
 
You can view generated flash file (.SWF) using Internet Explorer or another application that is capable of viewing and playing of  flash animations.
 
Generated flash movie in browser
 
 
You can download the source code of this example here: swfscout_vb.zip

Tutorials: