Adobe Flash Professional CS6 Adobe Flash Professional CS6 Classroom In A Book | Page 179

editing Armatures
You can easily edit the armature by repositioning the nodes or by deleting and add-
ing new bones. If one of the nodes of your armature is slightly off, for example, you
can use the Free Transform tool to rotate it or move it into a new position. This does
not change the bones, however.
You can also move nodes into new positions by holding down the Alt/Option key
while dragging the node to a different location.
If you want to remove bones, simply click on the bone that you want to delete and
press the Delete key on the keyboard. The selected bone and all the bones con-
nected to it down the chain will be removed. You can then add new bones if desired.
constraining Joints
The various joints of the crane can freely rotate, which isn’t particularly realistic.
Many armatures in real life are constrained to certain angles of rotation. For exam-
ple, your forearm can rotate up toward your bicep, but it can’t rotate in the other
direction beyond your bicep. When working with armatures in Flash Professional
CS6, you can choose to constrain the rotation for various joints or even constrain
the translation (movement) of the various joints.
Next, you’ll constrain the rotation and translation of the various joints of the crane
so they move more realistically.
constraining the rotation of joints
By default, the rotation of joints have no constraints, which means they can rotate
in a full circle, or 360 degrees. If you want a certain joint to rotate only in a quarter
circle arc, constrain the joint to 90 degrees.
1 Make sure that none of the nodes in your armature are pinned.
2 Click the second pose at frame 50 in the cranearmature layer, right-click/
Ctrl-click, and select Clear Pose.
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Lesson 5
Articulated Motion and Morphing