| print( ) Global Function | Flash 5 |
| print the frames of a movie or movie clip using vectors |
A string or reference indicating the path to the movie clip or document level to print (references are converted to paths when used in a string context).
A string indicating how the printed frames of target should be cropped when printed. Cropping is defined by a bounding box that represents the entire printed page. The region of target included in the printed page can be set using one of three legal values for boundingBox (which must be a literal string):
The bounding box for each printed frame is set individually to match the size of each frame's contents. Hence, every printed frame's content is scaled to fill the entire printed page. This maximizes the size of the printed images.
The area occupied by the content of all printed frames is combined to form a maximum bounding box. Each printed frame's content is scaled and placed on the printed page relative to the maximum bounding box. That is, each frame maintains its size relative to other frames, but all frames don't necessarily fill the printed page.
The bounding box for all printed frames is set to the size of a single, designated frame in the target clip. Content of printed frames larger than the designated frame is cropped to the bounding box of the designated frame. Content of printed frames smaller than the designated frame is not scaled. To designate a frame as the one on which the bounding box should be based, assign it the label #b.
Printing a Flash movie using a web browser's
built-in File 
Print function behaves
inconsistently and often results in poor quality printouts that
don't use vector printing. In some browsers, the
movie won't print at all, nor will most browsers
print more than one frame at a time. Using the
print( ) function, we can
print the contents of one or more frames of a movie with accuracy and
quality, directly from Flash. By default,
print( ) causes all of the
frames of target's
timeline to be printed, one frame per page, cropped or scaled
according to the boundingBox argument. To
designate specific frames for printing (while excluding undesignated
frames), we assign the label #p to the desired
frames.
The print( ) function sends vectors directly to PostScript printers and sends vectors converted to bitmaps to non-PostScript printers. Because print( ) uses vectors, it cannot be used to print movies with alpha transparency or color transformations. To print movies that have color effects, use printAsBitmap( ).
In Flash Player 4, the print functions are available via the Get Url Action (not available prior to build 4.0.20.0). For more details, see Macromedia's Flash Printing SDK, available at:
// Print every frame in the main movie timeline, scaling each to fill the page
print("_root", "bframe");
// Print every frame in the main movie timeline,
// sizing each frame relative to the combined size of all frames
print("_root", "bmax");
When the print_btn button is clicked, Flash prints all frames in the button's parent timeline, cropped to the bounding box of the frame with the label #b, and sized to fill the page:
print_btn.onRelease = function () {
print(this._parent, "bmovie");
}
getURL( ), printAsBitmap( ), printAsBitmapNum( ), printNum( )
