# Complex line animation
**URL:** https://forum.kirupa.com/t/complex-line-animation/5144
**Category:** Uncategorized
**Created:** [September 2, 2002, 11:01pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/complex-line-animation/5144 "2002-09-02T23:01:02Z")
**Posts on this page:** 3
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@tgfx](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/tgfx)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 11:01pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/complex-line-animation/5144/1 "2002-09-02T23:01:02Z")
greetings all,
my problem is this: I want to animate a line like it was being written on the computer screen with pen and ink. I have the final image that I want to produce, I just don’t know how to make an animation form it.
what I’ve tried so far is creating a mask tween to slowly expose parts of the final image until it’s all shown, but this process is pretty ugly to me. I’ve also tried shape tweening it, but all I can get out of this method is a bad morphing effect. the final image is complex, and I imported it from illustrator, so creating it totally in flash is pretty much out of the question.
anyone know a tutorial on this kind of thing? or can anyone at least point me in the right direction? thanks.
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### Author:  [@system](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/system)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 2:05am UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/complex-line-animation/5144/2 "2002-09-03T02:05:30Z")
sure thing… use your graphic on the screen (the final one, as a guide). Now, what you want to do is to draw a path so you can do a motion guide. You will guide a graphic of a pencil through a path that has been drawn with the pencil tool (or tool of your choice) using your final graphic to trace the approximate path of your final design.
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### Author:  [@system](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/system)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 3:31am UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/complex-line-animation/5144/3 "2002-09-03T03:31:28Z")
Thanks for the quick response Iammontoya.
I should have been more clear with my first post. I actually want the pencil/pen to be hidden. I want the form to become visible gradually as if it were being drawn (and I mean like with a calligraphic pen). With paths it seems like you can only move objects along them, not actually fill them in.
Let me know if I’m missing something. =)