Fix for Blurry Flash Using the 3D Transform Tool

About a week ago I had to put together a Flash piece for my company to help demonstrate an idea to our motion graphics person. The idea was simple enough: make an illustration turn a few degrees on the Y-axis and then turn back and make a loop. I imported my illustration to Flash, made my symbol, created the tween and then tweaked the Y-axis. Done and done. Or so I thought.

When testing I was horrified with the results. See for yourself.



My clean illustration had been converted to what looked like a low-res jpg. Definitely not ideal. I tinkered with the Publish settings but came up with the same results again and again. Eventually I turned to Google and discovered a plethora of similar stories...all with the same result as mine...and NO solutions!

How could Adobe allow such a horrible 3D experience? Had they just left something out? Were they afraid of competing with the 3D of After Effects? The Internets were beside themselves. I went forward with the project and turned it in because it really was only an example - not production ready.

Christmas comes. Christmas goes. And then I remembered that I had taught my Flash students how to use the 3D tool last semester and didn't recall any blurry results. I opened that project and sure enough - no blurring or pixelization! So what was different?

Illustrator had been the problem all along

The one common denominator in my testing was Illustrator. The test graphics (and my project graphics) had all been imported from Illustrator. My class project was not. After breaking everything apart (COMMAND-B) that had been imported from Illustrator, copying and then pasting into a NEW symbol the blurry was gone.



This totally fixed my blurry 3D problem in Flash CS4. And it was so simple.

Goodbye :(

Well, like a match in the wind, so has been the Zeromile Design blog. Now that I am working full-time for a "real" company I have had to shutter ZMD. It's been good times. love you all.

If you are in need of Web design please contact my good friends: Nate @ sparrowvisual.com or Christa @ webstudio7.net.

Thanks and God Bless :)
Jason

What Does zeromile Mean?

The name zeromile (no caps, very pretentious and artsy) began while driving down interstate 5 in 1991. On many freeways in California there are occasionally a series of "mile markers", signs that let you check your odometer against actual measured miles. There are, I believe, 5 signs in a row, beginning with "Mile 4" and subsequently counting down to "Mile 0." So, they count down, even though odometers count up - welcome to Californ-i-a.

0, the null set, is generally thought of as a beginning but, in this case, its an end. That's irony, Alanis.

In 1996, while researching zeromile as a possible band name, I discovered a town in India called Zeromile. Through various emails that I sent to city residents (at random) I learned that there is a stone that the town is built around called the "Zero Mile Stone" and it is at the exact geographic center of India. The people of the town had a tremendous reverence for it. It seemed so spiritual and unique. I mean, India has like 4 million gods - who probably all hang out at that stone. "Wow!", I thought, "What an amazing and mysterious legacy for a band name!" And zeromile the band was born.

Later I learned that in almost every continent, country, county, state, parish, township and city in the world there is a "Zero Mile Stone." Well, actually it's called a "Zero Mile Marker." They are usually located somewhere near a city hall. When a map says it's 220 miles from Fresno to LA it's really saying it's 220 miles from the Zero Mile Marker in Fresno to the Zero Mile Marker in Los Angeles. Still kind of cool, but not 4 million gods cool. [insert sound of air escaping runaway balloon]