| Learning Flash can be challenging for first-time and occasional users. Absorbing the concepts and workflow of timeline-based animation can be difficult initially. Scripting with ActionScript can be even more intimidating. With Behaviors and Timeline Effects, even first-time users can create interesting and useful effects easily, without scripting or working on the timeline. Timeline Effects automatically create timeline-based animations. Just apply an effect to a movie clip, set a few parameters on a configuration screen, and you're finished. You can create fade-ins, fade-outs, wipes, and simple position-rotation-scale animations. You can explode, expand, and squeeze objects, as well as apply drop shadows and blurs. There are limitations to how far you can go with this approach. For instance, if you combine effects, only the most recent effect is editable via its configuration screen. You have to adjust other effects on the timeline.  For more on combining Timeline Effects, see "Timeline Effects," page 400 in Chapter 18, "Animation, Interactivity, and Rich Media."
Still, Timeline Effects simplify the workflow for simple effects tremendously. They ease the learning curve for beginners . And they can be time-savers even for experienced users. Similarly, Behaviors make it easy to create simple interactivity. For instance, clicking a button can take the user to a designated point in the movie, load a graphic, cause a sound to play or stop playing, or open the browser and take the user to a Web site. In the background, each of these behaviors is implemented as ActionScript code. You can examine the code to learn from it. You can edit it. Or you can leave it alone. Thus, Behaviors can be a gentle introduction to ActionScript or a way of avoiding it. | 