Flash Banner Ads

[Froggyman]

I recently began selling ad space and a few sponsers have submited Shockwave banner ads that use the .swf file extensions. Flash is a weak subject for me and I am having dificulty with embedding the redirect url within the ad to count click thrus. I have Flash 5 and have had no success with doing this. Is there a freeware program that can do this more efficiently or can someone (BoneHeadicus?) offer some simple instructions to do this using Flash 5?

I got the basics down, (import the .swf and convert to .fla, etc). I'm just not familair with the software. Thanks!

[BoneHeadicus]

Hey froggyman.

In order to display Flash files on your page even if its a url you will have to have the embed tag. Below:

<object classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=4,0,2,0" width="0" height="-12">
<param name=movie value="FlashFileName.swf">
<param name=quality value=high>
<embed src="FlashFileName.swf" quality=high pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="0" height="-12">
</embed>
</object>

If you use Dreamweaver this function is built in on the objects palette.

BTW Do NOT converts .swf to .fla.
.fla is for Flash itself....the format it stores its files in.
.swf is for the viewing part.

[Froggyman]

I guess I made myself unclear. I'm not having trouble displaying the ad. I need to be able to embed a redirect url in the .swf file itself. That way when somebody clicks onto the ad it will act like a regular hyperlink and send the visitor to the advertiser's web site. The link has to be in the .swf file and I am wondering how to do this.

The .swf file cannot be edited as is. It needs to first be imported and converted into a .fla file. Once the url is embeded into the .fla file it will be converted back to a .swf file. Do you know of any freeware programs that will do this easier?

[BoneHeadicus]

Oh yes. If you want a cool tool for quick and dirty Flash projects go see Swish [swishzone.com]. You can spit out banners in a flash ;)

The file sizes tend to be on the porky side, especially with sound.

[Froggyman]

Thanks BH. Sorry for the late reply- picked up another client and been real busy.

I downloaded the FrogFile and figured out had to add the url to the graphic. Now Flash 5 won't let me save it back as a .swf file. It's always something, I'd rather be writing Perl...

[BoneHeadicus]

Froggyman you can open your files and then "open as library" the FrogFile under file on the tool bar. Drag the BGcolor symbol from the library window into your project. Then go to the edit symbols tab upper right corner and open BG color symbol and modify the color and size and url. You shouldn't have any problems saving it.

Flash ain't for dummies...thats for sure. It can be extremely frustrating at times. I don't use it everyday so I have to go back and relearn things from time to time. Even simple things can be difficult cuz if you don't know....you dont know.

[Froggyman]

Thanks BH. I finally pieced it together.Wouldn't have been able to figure it out without your help:)