Using blurfilter on movieclip mask

programming flash
1

Hi everyone,
I have a movieclip, “clip1”, that is being masked by “mask1”. the mask starts as a small circle and grows into a big one, gradually showing the screen. However, the sharp corners on the mask are bugging me and I want it to have soft corners as it goes across the screen. I’ve read around, and it seems like a blurfilter may be able to do the trick. However, I can’t seem to tell any difference; the corners are not softened whatsoever. I can’t post the actual code, but here’s what the important snippet of code looks like:

ActionScript Code:
[LEFT][COLOR=#993300]var[/COLOR] clip1:[COLOR=#993300]MovieClip[/COLOR]=[COLOR=#993300]new[/COLOR] MovieClip1[COLOR=#000000]([/COLOR][COLOR=#000000])[/COLOR];

[COLOR=#993300]var[/COLOR] mask1:[COLOR=#993300]MovieClip[/COLOR]=[COLOR=#993300]new[/COLOR] MaskClip1COLOR=#000000[/COLOR];
[COLOR=#993300]var[/COLOR] blurMask:BlurFilter=[COLOR=#993300]new[/COLOR] BlurFilterCOLOR=#000000[/COLOR];
[COLOR=#993300]public[/COLOR] [COLOR=#993300]function[/COLOR] MainASCOLOR=#000000[/COLOR][COLOR=#000000]{[/COLOR]
blurMask.[COLOR=#000000]blurX[/COLOR]=[COLOR=#000000]15[/COLOR];
blurMask.[COLOR=#000000]blurY[/COLOR]=[COLOR=#000000]15[/COLOR];
blurMask.[COLOR=#993300]quality[/COLOR]=[COLOR=#000000]2[/COLOR];
addChildCOLOR=#000000[/COLOR];
mask1.[COLOR=#993300]gotoAndStop[/COLOR]COLOR=#000000[/COLOR];
mask1.[COLOR=#000000]filters[/COLOR]=[COLOR=#000000][[/COLOR]blurMask[COLOR=#000000]][/COLOR];
clip1.[COLOR=#000000]mask[/COLOR]=mask1;
addChildCOLOR=#000000[/COLOR];
[COLOR=#000000]}[/COLOR]
[/LEFT]

Any help would be IMMENSELY appreciated. Thanks a ton!
-Cody

2

“the sharp corners on the mask are bugging me and I want it to have soft corners as it goes across the screen”

i’m expecting that feature too… for a long time! Complain to adobe about the support for masks with levels of transparency (support for grays, really don’t know how to say this technically). Sadly a mask in flash support only black or white, so all gray that you could but giving a blur effect will not display.
Anyway you might want to consider the possibility of false masking you content with a transparent png, making a whole on it, and use it as a patch.

3 

clip1.cacheAsBitmap = true;
mask1.cacheAsBitmap = true;

I attached a sample FLA for you. Flash does support 32bit when masking.

http://www.mediahead.com/mask.fla