Trying to mimic an effect - growing vines (masking?)

Hello all, I’m new to the forums but I’ve been enjoying Kirupa’s tutorials for a while.

I’m trying to mimic the look of vines growing, or drawing themselves. It’s hard to describe. The closest example I could dig up is here:

http://www.tattoo-world.ru/index.php/ru/

You’ll notice the vines, or little tribal shapes drawing from behind the guy.

I assume this was a mask thing, but a complex one since the vines loop around and double back on its self.

I’ve googled, and searched the forums but I haven’t been able to find out how to do this. Perhaps because I’m not sure what to call it.

Thank you very much.

Pseudo
www.pseudodigm.com

hmmm… i’m not for sure what vines your talking about… the one’s on the menu?

:p:

They start to appear after a few seconds from behind the man. I’d isolate that part of the animation if I could, but he has password protected his swf.

It doesn’t happen right away, but if you wait just a few seconds you’ll begin to see movement.

Ive done a similar thing with a signature on a site.

Why don’t you draw your final vine design how you want it to grow to (on a layer). then add key frame by key frame deleting a small bit at a time till you have none left.

select and reverse the frames. when you play it now looks like it is being drawn or growing. ive used this technique loads of times, (Im more are a designer than a scripter ) I find this works and really smooth and well, all tho you need to use a bit of artistic intuition whilst deleting bits.

signiture quick demo FLA

signiture quick demo SWF

Oh, that’s very nice! I’m a dofus for not thinking of that. Thanks, I’ll give it a go.

either use a tween, masking, or a lot of math.

was looking around for transitions a couple of days ago and came across this:

http://www.kirupaforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=62804&highlight=transitions

has a sweet example .fla which, I think, is pretty much exactly what you are looking for

Yeah thats ok a standard mask, but to get the exact same effect as pseudodigm was after the one on the site http://www.tattoo-world.ru/index.php/ru/ looks like its scripted or a frame by frame mask done on loads of layers it is so smooth, ive used masks a lot, but to get them that smooth. i dont know, gunna have a go