Hang in there....just a few more days until the Break!

This week we are discussing shape tweening -- animations that morph the shape of a symbol to convey the data change through time. With shape tweening, it is possible to do motion tweening at the same time (moving the symbol across the stage while it is changing shape).

Shape tweening is very engaging when done well (but it takes time to get it to work smoothly). Here are some examples to dissect:
Maps of War (we looked at these before but they are really good examples of morphing animations)
Imperial History
History of Religion
March of Democracy (not as good...rather flashy...but interesting from a design and interface standpoint)
American History (warning: it has narration)
A cartogram generator that uses nice shape tweens.

From a technical standpoint, here is the official Adobe page on shape tweens. Please read through the notes on shape hints. They help control the morphing Flash does by letting the program know where particular spots of the symbol need to be during the morph. For our Russian invasion, shape hints can help us keep our front line on land (it wants to bleed into water bodies).

This is not an animation, but you might find it interesting and/or amusing (as amusing as Geographers tend to get).