Aligning Elements

As you get into the process of animation, you'll discover how important alignment can be. Flash's grids, guides, and Snap features (see Chapter 1) help you align items on the Stage manually. Flash also offers automated alignment through the Align panel. You can line up selected items by their top, bottom, left, or right edges or by their centers ( Figure 5.21 ). You can align the items to each other or align them to the Stagefor example, you can place the top edge of all selected items at the top edge of the Stage. Flash can also resize one item to match the dimensions of anothermaking them the same width, for example.

To access alignment options

• Choose Window > Align, or press -K (Mac) or Ctrl-K (Windows) ( Figure 5.22 ).

  Figure 5.22. Choose Window > Align to open the Align panel.

  

  The Align panel appears ( Figure 5.23 ). You can apply any of the alignment options to selected items on the Stage.

  Figure 5.23. The Align panel offers options for aligning selected items horizontally and vertically, distributing items evenly in horizontal or vertical space, forcing items to match each other (or the Stage) in width and height, and creating even spacing between items.

  

To align items

Tips

• The Match Size section of the Align panel contains three buttons for forcing selected items to have the same width or height. To expand all items to be the same width as the widest item, choose Match Width (the far-left button); to expand all items to be the same height as the tallest item, choose Match Height (the middle button); to do both, choose Match Width and Height (the far-right button).

• You can make your alignment adjustments relative to the edges of the Stage by clicking the To Stage button. For example, with To Stage selected, choosing Align Bottom Edge puts the bottom edges of all the selected items at the bottom of the Stage. Choosing Match Size makes selected items as tall as the Stage.

• In addition to aligning items horizontally and vertically, you can create equal horizontal or vertical space among three or more items. The buttons in the Distribute section of the Align panel let you equalize the horizontal space between selected elements' left edges, centers, or right edges or equalize the vertical space between selected items' top edges, centers, or bottom edges.

• Use the Align panel's Space options to create equal horizontal or vertical space between items' inside edges.