Use Templates to Design Your Document
The list of template choices on the Start page demonstrates that Flash is used for many different applications. The list ranges in subject from banner ad templates for the Web to hand-held mobile device templates. Templates can be useful if you’re designing for output you are unfamiliar with. The presets for subject-specific templates relate to the output media. For example, if your final goal is to produce a standard quiz and you are new to Flash, selecting a Quiz template (under “More”) provides you with a “fill-in-the-blanks” template.

Create a New Document from a Template
To select a new template from the Start page, click a folder in the Create From Template column. When you do so, the New From Template dialog box appears, as shown here.

In this dialog box you can choose a specific template category and see a preview of the template if one is available. When you have decided on a template, click the OK button and the template will appear. Templates contain information on the format you have selected. Some templates are more complex than others, as demonstrated in the presentation template in Figure 2-1. This template is complete with multiple layers and scripts on frames.

Create a Custom Template
If the Flash template selections don’t work for your project, you can easily create your own template. Create a Flash document and select File | Save as Template from the menu. In the Save As Template dialog box (shown at the bottom of the next page), input a name. For Category, you can select from

the pop-up list of Flash templates or create your own category. A description input box allows you to jot down notes relevant to the template style, such as dimensions, layers, colors, etc.

When you create a custom category, it will be added to the Flash template category list on the Start page. To delete a template, navigate to the Flash 8 templates folder on your computer. In Windows, the template folder is located in the Flash 8 folder (en | Configuration | Templates).

On the Mac, the template folder is located in the following path: Home | Library | Application Support | Macromedia | Flash 8 | en | Configuration | Templates. To delete a category or to delete templates in a category folder, drag the folder or template into the trash. Alternately, you can
right-click and select Delete (in Windows) or ctrl-click and then select Move to Trash (on the Mac).

Working with templates allows beginners to jump into a project quickly. Templates can also hasten the workflow for more experienced designers.