Reversing Frames

Sometimes, you can save effort by creating just half the animation that you need and letting Flash do the rest of the work. Think of the candle flame you created in the preceding section. You might want the flame to grow larger and then shrink back to its original size. The shrinking phase is the reverse of the growing phase. You can make a copy of the growing-flame animation and then have Flash reverse the order of the frames.

To reverse the order of frames

1.	Open the document you created in the preceding section. This movie spans five frames on three layers. The first keyframe shows the flame as three concentric oval shapes; the final keyframe shows the flame in a taller, flickering configuration.
2.	In the Timeline, select all five frames on all three layers.
3.	In one of the selected frames, Control-click (Mac) or right-click (Windows) to access the frame-editing contextual menu; then choose Copy Frames (Figure 11.21). Figure 11.21. The contextual menu for frames lets you copy all selected frames with a single command.
4.	In the Timeline, select frame 6 in all three layers.
5.	In one of the selected frames, Control-click (Mac) or right-click (Windows) to access the frame-editing contextual menu, and choose Paste Frames. Your movie now contains two back-to-back animation sequences of the growing flame (Figure 11.22). Figure 11.22. After you paste the copied selection, you have two tween sequences ending with the tall, flickering flame.
6.	In the Timeline, select frames 610 on all three layers.
7.	Choose Modify > Timeline > Reverse Frames (Figure 11.23). Figure 11.23. Choosing Modify > Timeline > Reverse Frames rearranges the order of selected frames. Use this command to make a selected tween run backward. Flash reverses the tween in the second sequence so that the flame starts out tall and flickery, and winds up in its original oval configuration in the final keyframe (Figure 11.24). Figure 11.24. After you reverse the frames, the second tween sequence ends with the oval flame.