Adobe® Flash® Professional CS5 Classroom in a Book® > Working with Graphics > Creating Transparencies

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Creating Transparencies

Next, you’ll create a second wave to overlap the first wave. You’ll make the second wave slightly transparent to create more overall depth. Transparency can be applied to either the stroke or the fill. Transparency is measured as a percentage and is referred to as alpha. An alpha of 100% indicates that a color is totally opaque, whereas an alpha of 0% indicates that a color is totally transparent.

Modifying the alpha value of a fill

1.	Select the shape in the dark brown wave layer.
2.	Choose Edit > Copy.
3.	Choose Insert > Timeline > Layer and name the new layer light brown wave.
4.	Choose Edit > Paste in Place (Ctrl/Command+Shift+V). The Paste in Place command puts the copied item in the exact same position from where it was copied.
5.	Choose the Selection tool and move the pasted shape slightly to the left or to the right so the crests of the waves are somewhat offset.
6.	Select the fill of the shape in the light brown wave layer.
7.	In the Color panel (Window > Color), set the fill color to a slightly different brown hue (CC6666), and then change the Alpha value to 50%. Note You can also change the transparency of a shape from the Properties inspector by clicking the Fill Color icon and changing the Alpha value in the pop-up color menu. The color swatch at the bottom of the Color panel previews your newly selected color. Transparencies are indicated by the gray pattern that appears behind the color swatch.