Transforming basic 2d square into 3d?

[griffen]

I've got a very plain 2D square with some text, but I'm looking to rotate the square so that it transforms into a 3D square. While this is all going on the text rotates with the square. Would this require the use of Swift3D or is there an easier way of morphing between the two?

Thanks.

[pellepiano]

To make 2d into 3d ( and not just flipping (skewing ) the 2d square ) you need a program like Swift 3d. And animating 3d is going to cost you some kb, even if it is exported as vectors.
On the other hand there is some examples in the movies section of mapping a 3d cube with your own images, made in Flash and there is a company that sells components that contain different Flash 3d shapes you can map ( dont remember their name at tho moment though ).

[JLM]

Bit-101 most recent experiment is a component for rotating drawing api created text the square to box thing is also possible with flash, But it is all actionscript and not really that easy, I played with some other peoples 3d engines to make a dice and it can be very processor hungry.

Not impossible but if your actionscript is not good then might be better to use key frames and tweens. You will need to break the text into vectors distribute to layers insert new keyframe and distort shape tween it then spend quite a while defining adding shape hints. using another lay as a reference may help but the details of order etc can be tricky. There is an example of this technique on my holding page which I need to change into a proper site soon; http://www.JustInFront.net

3rd party software maybe the best option, using something like 3D max you could rotate text and import into flash as bmp's then trace bitmap optimise for each frame, some packages more flash specific can do it with vectors but I have not used them.

JLM


PS for the 3D method with actionscript you can't really use an image of the text since, the technique is to break a square that is distorted into two masked stretched skewed triangles. With text the sharp edges would not align at the intersection between triangles, with images the pictures can be choosen to reduce this effect, but with text it is likely to be more noticeable.

[farafiro]

JLM

nice site's name

[JLM]

Thanks

Off topic:
got any ideas for logos... since this one, and my other idea dolphin shaped J in front of a ship are not 'Design' enough.

[farafiro]

well, I always get 0 in design

[JLM]

I have a O in the middle at the moment maybe thats the problem

[farafiro]

heheheeeeeeee
;)
try to push it to the end :p