SWF to AVI in top quality? Is it possible?

[bravepills]

I've made a fancy animation that I want to use as the opening sequence to my home movies. I made them with Macromedia 8 Flash.

Problem is, although I can export them as avi files, they don't play the same, it looks a mess. How can I use swf files without losing quality?

I don't really want to buy new software for this. I have plenty of conversion software already, ie. 'xillisoft', 'bink and smacker' and a couple others, they do swf, but the results are poor.

What is the point of these programs if you can't apply the finished product!!

It's not like it's cheap aswell!!!!


any help is welcome

[zuluclayman]

It may be a case of getting your .avi settings correct rather than trying to get good quality from .swf files which are really only designed for web use.
When you save the avi file, what settings are you using? - I don't have Flash 8, (have Flash MX Pro 2004 and Flash CS3) so some things may be different -
set the pixel dimensions close to those you will be using in your video editing software (eg: I use PAL settings in Australia so DVD mpeg2 quality is 720 x 576 - you will know your pixel count hopefully and may need to adjust for widescreen) and untick the box that says "compress video" - this will lead to larger file sizes (55 sec animation I have done = 354MB) but will leave the animation good quality for use in editing software that you use for your home movies.

[bravepills]

Thanks for your reply zuluclayman.

I have tried tweaking the export options as you suggested (changed pixels, selected to not compress) also tried the other options, although it's rather limited and do have much better results.

The animation is clear (none of that black blocky pixelation I was getting), but the actual animation is extremely jerky, not all nice and smooth like in the original file.

I use either Sony Vegas 7 or WMM to make movies, depends how fancy I want to make it (WMM is very easy to use, but Vegas infinitely more advanced). Strangely in AVI format, WMM will play the file (still jerky), but Vegas plays it as a still image! Also, WMP and QT Player play it fine and VLC simply crashes!

Anyway, it's not perfect, but it's better. Still unusable though really.

If you have any other suggestions I'd be grateful.

Thanks again

[zuluclayman]

The problem with it being jerky is probably to do with the frame rates used in Flash - sounds like it is too slow. A frame rate anywhere between 6-15fps (and possibly more) will work depending on the type of animation you are doing. the best thing is to "taste and try" start at a few fps more than you currently have in your project and see how that performs when exported and keep going until you get it right - then write it down somewhere so you will remember for future animation-to-video projects.
If you have Vegas 7 you could use that for your animation - images in Flash can be exported as a bitmap or jpeg series which could then be brought into Vegas, choose the time each still image is on-screen for then export as a movie clip (mpeg or avi) to then be brought into your home movies. this is how I approach claymation - take the pics of a scene, bring them into Premiere with each image being on-screen for 3-5 frames, make this into an .avi with little compression, do this for all scenes, then bring them in to a new project as a movie clip and edit it as you would with any other video material.

[bravepills]

OK, I'll have a play with frame rate, hopefully that will work.

If it doesn't I'll have a go the other way you said. Basically you mean using a series of pics to make the animation yes?

I'll post back my results.

Thanks for your help

[Abrianna]

hi, iwisoft swf to avi converter can convert swf to avi with best quality. It can maintain the excellent original video and audio quality. you may have a try. It works well for me. I love it.