Making Flash Photo Gallery with Interactive Thumbnails

Creating Website Banner Animation can take quite a while, even more for someone who has little experience in Adobe Flash. However I come across this neat software which help you create website banner animation in less than 30 seconds without using Adobe Flash. Anyone without Actionscript nor Flash experience can create website banner animation very easily.

Here is the result:

Software:IncrediShow 2.0
Time:Less than 1 hour
Skill:Beginner

Steps:

1. Prepare 5 images with size of 500 x 376 pixels for each along with their thumbnails with size of 95 x 69 pixels. You don't have to be glued with these sizes, just in this tutorial we need you to do so.

2. Run IncrediShow

3. Click "Files" menu bar, choose "New Project", and tick "Create an empty project" radio button.



At "Creating a new project" window, set the dimension to 530 x 480.



Look at the "Project Timeline" window, click the right button of your mouse over the first photo slot and choose "Insert Empty Slide" as shown below.

4. Set "Background" window to "Gradient" followed by "Horizontal" type and set the gradient color as shown below.



The middle color box in the gradient bar is no particular color, just click at any point in the gradient bar between the first and last existing color box, move it back and forward to adjust the appearance similar to the example file.

5. Your Photo Gallery will have 5 images. Import 5 images with size of 500x376 and position them on the same spot, so one lay on top of another. The first image, img01.jpg, should appear above all the others.

Rename each object according to their respective file names, particularly in the suffix number, will much help you in setting some actions to show/hide them at step 8. Moreover, you may give each image any transition effect to make them look more attractive.

6. Arrange the thumbnail images as shown on the above picture.

7. At "Action" tab menu of thumb01 object, under "On Press" event set the "Add action" menu to the following actions Show img01 and Hide all images with suffix number other than 01.

8. Repeat step 8 for the remaining thumbnail objects.

9. Now you can play the movie by pressing the Play button.

10. When you are ready you can publish the movie to HTML + SWF file by clicking "Publish" menu bar and choosing "Flash and HTML File" menu.



You can now upload the SWF and HTML file into your website. IncrediShow also allows you to publish your slideshow into DVD, movie file, IPhone/IPod/IPad, PSP and mobile phones.

11. Congratulations! You have created your Website banner.

Here is the result: