How would someone change sound levels of a music playing in a loop? For example, I'm making a game and at a certain frame I want the music level (music.wav) to be decreased to half of its volume.
How could someone do this in AS3?
You are using the word "loop" in a confusing way. In programming, a loop usually refers to one of the "for" loops that looks like this:
for (var i:int = 0; i < 10; i++)
{
//do stuff 10 times
}
I surmise that this is not what you mean by loop, but rather that you would like a MovieClip or the main timeline to decrease the volume of a Sound object at the end of n frames. Or do you just mean the music itself is looping? Hopefully you see the value of asking well written questions. That being said..
Mind you, I haven't tried this, but according to my reference book (ActionScript 3.0 Cookbook by Lott, Schall & Peters) you need to use a SoundTransform object which specifies the volume at which you want the sound to be set. Try this:
var _sound:Sound = new Sound(music.wav); // creates a Sound object which has no internal volume control
var channel:SoundChannel = _sound.play(); // creates a SoundChannel which has a soundTransform property
var transform:SoundTransform = new SoundTransform(); // SoundTransform objects have a property called "volume". This is what you need to change volume.
Now in your loop (or on the frame event that you are using) do this:
transform.volume *= 0.9; // or whatever factor you want to have it decrease
//transform.volume /= 1.1; // or this if you prefer.
channel.soundTransform = transform; //
So anytime you want the volume to decrease by this incremental amount, run this bit of code. Of course, you need to make sure that any variables you set are accessible in the code that is referencing them. One way that comes to mind to do this is with a function.
private function soundDiminish(st:SoundTransform, c:SoundChannel, factor:Number = 0.9):void
{
st.volume *= factor;
c.soundTransform = st;
}
Now, whenever you want to diminish the volume just call the soundDiminish function.
Maybe your frame event looks like this:
function onLoadFrame(fe:Event):void
{
soundDiminish(transform, channel); // 3rd parameter optional
}
If you only want this function to be called every 20 frames then:
function onLoadFrame(fe:Event):void
{
// this is a counter that will count up each time this frame event happens
frameCount ++;
if (frameCount >= 20)
{
soundDiminish(transform, channel); // 3rd parameter optional
frameCount = 0; // reset the frame counter
}
}
Related
I have rocks and enemy ninjas moving off the screen. The ninjas are supposed to disappear after being hit by a shuriken once, however they are taking two hits to disappear, although the shurikens disappear every time fine. The code is nearly identical for the shurikens and enemy ninjas, however the ninjas don't seem to work properly. I also get the occasional ninja getting stuck somewhere on the screen and shurikens pass through it.
//If a rock moves off the screen, it is spliced.
if (rock[j].x <= -301){
removeChild(rock[j]);
rock.splice(j, 1);
rockNum--;
}
}
for (var q=shurikens.length - 1; q >= 0; q--){
for (var w=enemy.length - 1; w >= 0; w--){
//If the shurikens hit the ninjas.
if ((shurikens[q]).hitTestObject(enemy[w])){
removeChild(enemy[w]);
enemy.splice(w, 1);
ninjaNum--;
removeChild(shurikens[q]);
shurikens.splice(q, 1);
break;
}
}
}
}
How to fix your code, and give you some performance tips:
This code is very "bug friendly": you are modifying the "length" property of array within a for/in loop that relied on the same property, this is really not a wise thing to do.
The way I would do it:
// Create an array where to store colliding ninjas and shurikens
var depleted:Array = [];
// Create local references to make code more readable and fast (querying arrays all the time is slow).
var ninja:DisplayObject;
var shuriken:DisplayObject;
// Loop in shurikens (no need to check if shurikens have been depleted, since you query only once each of them
for (var q:int=shurikens.length - 1; q >= 0; q--){
shuriken = shurikens[q]; // Assign a shuriken to our variable so you avoid to call further shurikens[q];
for (var w:int=enemy.length - 1; w >= 0; w--){ // Loop in ninjas
ninja = enemy[w]; // Assign ninja
//If the shurikens hit the ninjas. (only if ninjas have not yet been removed)
// This is the core of our improvement, before calling hitTest that is slow, you first check that ninjas have not already been killed
if (depleted.indexOf(ninja) == -1 &&
shuriken.hitTestObject(ninja)){
// It's a hit with a live ninja. I just add both objects to depleted list.
depleted.push(ninja);
depleted.push(shuriken);
break; // Breaking the loop, makes sure shuriken cannot hit 2 ninjas
}
}
}
// Then, you loop in the list of killed ninjas and depleted shurikens, and remove them from arrays and display list
for each (var depletedObj:DisplayObject in depleted) {
// First remove object from the relevant array
if (shurikens.indexOf(depletedObj) != -1) shurikens.splice(shurikens.indexOf(depletedObj), 1); // If it was in the shurikens array remove from there
else if (enemy.indexOf(depletedObj) != -1) enemy.splice(enemy.indexOf(depletedObj), 1); // If it was in the ninjas array remove from there
// The do all necessary stuff to remove object from DisplayList (end eventually add it to an object pooling list)
removeChild(depletedObj);
}
ninjaNum = enemy.length; // Update number of ninjas
Another hint, in case you run this for loops on each frame, if you place ninjas and shurikens in 2 different DisplayObjectContainer, you can first hitTest the 2 large containers, and once they collide, you can run the loops to check fine collisions. Also, in numeric for/in loops, declare variables always as :int. Typing variable makes it faster to access than an untyped variable. You can of course improve this code to make it faster, i.e.: adding a "alive = true" property to shurikens and ninjas, so you do not need to query a third array, etc.
I would like to change the volume of a soundchannel, instead of turning it off/ starting it from the beginning.
Here is a bit of my code dealing with the soundchannel, musicIcon toggles the sound.
function musicToggle(e:TouchEvent){
if(musicIcon.alpha != 1){
Chn_musicLoop = musicLoop.play(0,int.MAX_VALUE);
//Instead of restarting the music, I would like to set the volume to it's max (1)
musicIcon.alpha *= 2;
}
else{
musicIcon.alpha *= .5;
Chn_musicLoop.stop();
//Instead of stopping the music, I would like to set the volume to 0.
}}
What code would I need to do this?
I believe you are looking for SoundTransform class.
Basically:
var st:SoundTransform = new SoundTransform(0.5, 0);
Chn_musicLoop.soundTransform = st;
The SoundTransform parameter of 0.5 would put your "volume" at halfway. The parameter is a range from 0 to 1.
Here's a reference in AS3 from adobe:
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/ActionScript/3.0_ProgrammingAS3/WS5b3ccc516d4fbf351e63e3d118a9b90204-7d1f.html
When one of my sprites is being dragged (moved around), I'm cycling through other sprites on the canvas, checking whether they are in range, and if they are, I set a background glow on them. Here is how I'm doing it now:
//Sprite is made somewhere else
public var circle:Sprite;
//Array of 25 sprites
public var sprites:Array;
public function init():void {
circle.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, startDrag);
}
private function startDrag(event:MouseEvent):void {
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_MOVE, glowNearbySprites);
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, stopDrag);
circle.startDrag();
}
private function stopDrag(event:MouseEvent):void {
stage.removeEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_MOVE, glowNearbySprites);
stage.removeEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, stopDrag);
circle.stopDrag();
}
private function glowNearbySprites(event:MouseEvent):void {
for (var i = 0; i < sprites.length; i++) {
var tSprite = sprites.getItemAt(i) as Sprite;
if (Math.abs(tSprite.x - circle.x) < 30 &&
Math.abs(tSprite.y - circle.y) < 30) {
tSprite.filters = [new GlowFilter(0xFFFFFF)];
}
else {
tSprite.filters = null;
}
}
}
Basically I'm cycling through each sprite every time a MOUSE_MOVE event is triggered. This works fine, but the lag when dragging the sprite around is pretty noticeable. Is there a way to do this that is more efficient, with no or less lag?
Well, depending on the size of the amount of sprites you have, it may be trivial. However, if you're dealing with over 1k sprites -- use a data structure to help you reduce the amount of checks. Look at this QuadTree Demo
Basically you have to create indexes for all the sprites, so that you're not checking against ALL of them. Since your threshold is 30, when a sprite moves, you could place it into a row/column index of int(x / 30), int(y / 30). Then you can check just the sprites that exist in 9 columns around the row/column index of the mouse position.
While this would seem more cumbersome, it actually it way more efficient if you have more items -- the number of checks stays consistent even as you add more sprites. With this method I'm assuming you could run 10k sprites without any hiccup.
Other performance optimizations would be:
use an vector/array of sprites rather than getChildAt
preincrement i (++i)
store a static single instance glowfilter, so it's only one array, rather creating a separate filter for all the sprites.
GlowFilter is pretty CPU intensive. Might make sense to draw all the sprites together in one shot, and then apply GlowFilter once to it -- (this of course depends on how you have things set up -- might even be more cumbersome to blit your own bitmap).
Make your variable declaration var sprite:Sprite = .... If you're not hard typing it, it has to do the "filters" variable lookup by string, and not by the much faster getlex opcode.
I'd incorporate all the improvements that The_asMan suggested. Additionally, this line:
tSprite.filters = [new GlowFilter(0xFFFFFF)];
is probably really bad, since you're just creating the same GlowFilter over and over again, and creating new objects is always expensive (and you're doing this in a for loop every time a mouse_move fires!). Instead create it once when you create this class and assign it to a variable:
var whiteGlow:GlowFilter = new GlowFilter(0xFFFFFF);
...
tSprite.filters = [whiteGlow];
If you're still having performance issues after this, consider only checking half (or even less) of the objects every time you call glowNearbySprites (set some type of flag that will let it know where to continue on the next call (first half of array or second half). You probably won't notice any difference visually, and you should be able to almost double performance.
Attempting to compile the suggestions by others into a solution based on your original code, so far I've created the GlowFilter only once and re-used, secondly I've changed the loop to use a for each instead of the iterant based loop, third I've updated to use ENTER_FRAME event instead of MOUSE_MOVE. The only thing I've left out that's been suggested so far that I see is using a Vector, my knowledge there is pretty much nil so I'm not going to suggest it or attempt until I do some self education. Another Edit
Just changed the declaration of sprites to type Vector no code here for how it's populated but article below says you can basically treat like an Array as it has all the same method implemented but has a couple of caveats you should be aware of, namely that you cannot have empty spots in a Vector and so if that is a possibility you have to declare it with a size. Given it knows the type of the object this probably gets a performance gain from being able to compute the exact position of any element in the array in constant time (sizeOfObject*index + baseOffset = offset of item). The exact performance implications aren't entirely clear but it would seem this will always result in at least as good as Array times if not better.
http://www.mikechambers.com/blog/2008/08/19/using-vectors-in-actionscript-3-and-flash-player-10/
//Array of 25 sprites
public var sprites:Vector.<Sprite>;
private var theGlowFilterArray:Array;
public function init():void
{
theGlowFilterArray = [new GlowFilter(0xFFFFFF)];
circle.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, startDrag);
}
private function startDrag(event:MouseEvent):void
{
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, stopDrag);
addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, glowNearbySprites);
circle.startDrag();
}
private function stopDrag(event:MouseEvent):void
{
stage.removeEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, stopDrag);
removeEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, glowNearbySprites);
circle.stopDrag();
}
private function glowNearbySprites(event:Event):void
{
var circleX:Number = circle.x;
var circleY:Number = circle.y;
for each(var tSprite:Sprite in sprites) {
if (Math.abs(tSprite.x - circleX) < 30 && Math.abs(tSprite.y - circleY) < 30)
tSprite.filters = theGlowFilterArray;
else
tSprite.filters = null;
}
}
You problem is that making calculations that are at least linear O(n) on every mouse change event is terribly inefficient.
One simple heuristic to bring down the amount of times that you make your calculations is to save the distance to the closest sprite and only after mouse moved that distance would you recalculate the potential crash. This can be calculated in constant time O(1).
Notice that this works only when one sprite moves at a time.
I have loaded some images through XML and attached into dynamically created MovieClips named mc0,mc1,mc2...etc.
_loader.removeEventListener(ProgressEvent.PROGRESS, onLoadingAction);
count++;
var img:Bitmap = Bitmap(e.target.content);
img.cacheAsBitmap = true;
img.smoothing = true;
img.alpha = 0;
TweenLite.to(MovieClip(my_mc.getChildByName("mc"+count)).addChild(img),1, {alpha:1,ease:Quint.easeIn});
and within ENTER_FRAME handler
for (i=0; i < mc.numChildren; i++)
{
my_mc.getChildAt(i).x -= Math.round((mouseX-stage.stageWidth/2)*.006);
}
Everthing works fine. But it is shaking so that it was not looking good.
How do I achieve smooth movement?
One solution I've used is to round the (x,y) position to the closest integer. No matter that you've added smoothing to your bitmap and cached it, rounding could make it feel less choppy and way smoother.
Another thing you need to be careful is the dimensions of the images. Images that have an odd dimension won't be smoothed the same way as images with even dimensions. Check how to workaround this in my blog post Flash Smoothing Issue.
Since Flash has a variable frame rate (in the sense that it will drop frames), one shouldn't depend on the entering of a frame as a unit of action. Rather, it would be wiser to calculate the elapsed time explicitly.
For instance, in the enter frame handler:
var currentTime:Number = (new Date()).time;
for (i=0; i < mc.numChildren; i++)
{
my_mc.getChildAt(i).x -= speed * (currentTime - lastTime); // speed is in px/ms
}
lastTime = currentTime;
where you have the variable lastTime declared somewhere in a persistent scope:
var lastTime:Number = (new Date()).time;
I don't know if this addresses what you are calling "shaking", but it's at least something to consider.
Well, I'm doing a checkers game and I need to refer a piece by its position (x and y, both) and remove it from the screen (no problem with this).
I've been traying combinations with "this." but nothing.
How would you do that?
this.x and this.y are functional from the scope of your checkers pieces object; however, if you're accessing a piece outside of their scope, you must use a piece's instance name. Although not optimal, you could loop through children DisplayObjects.
// create a collection of your checker pieces
var checkers:Array = [];
// create a checker piece, whatever your DisplayObject class is.
var checker:Checker;
checkers.push(checker);
// add it to the stage, probably your game board
addChild(checker);
checker.x = 100;
checker.y = 100;
// loop through the children (from your game board)
for (var i:uint = 0; i < numChildren; i++)
{
var checker:DisplayObject = getChildAt(i);
trace(checker.x);
trace(checker.y);
}
Using coordinates to reference a piece may not be optimal for game play. You might want to consider a row / column or approach it from how your game board works.
If this is not clear, you should specify some code or expand your question with more detail.