Webmaster Forum / Flash / General Flash Topics / July 2008

Hello,

You can use a mask layer.  A mask will cut out everything thats not within
it's boundary.

Create a new layer in your main timeline and call it Mask.  Drag this layer to
the top so that it covers all the elements on stage that you want to show.  Use
the Rectangle tool and draw a square the same size as the Stage. Position it in
the centre and then right-click on your Mask layer in the timeline and select
Mask from the menu that appears.  You'll notice that the layer directly below
it will be locked and be nested under the Mask layer.  What you want to do now
is drag any other layers that you want masked, up and under the Mask layer, so
that it's nested as well.  Then you want to lock that layer so the mask will
take effect.

You can do the same thing for your movieclip symbol except on that movieclip's
timeline.

Take a look in the Flash help for how to use the loadMovie or MovieClipLoader
methods to load external SWF movies.  Loading SWF files is a very common
question in this forum.

Hope that helps