Flash 3D With Microsoft Word 97+

All the credit for this technique goes to paul of Flashpad (defunct). Paul duscovered this technique, and while I don't know how many people use it, it seems like a nice quick way to do 3D. In that light, I thought it would be good to have a tutorial on it for those who missed paul's post (also defunct) on Flashpad about the discovery.

Since I don't have Word97 (lame, I know), I have no demos of this technique. If anyone else does, and wants it to be an example, just mail me.

Pros: Cons:
  • Easy.
  • Supports perspective.
  • Everyone who's not me has Word97.
  • It's cheaper than Dimensions.
  • File size is large because of PostScript gradients.
  • Cannot rotate more than 180 degrees.
  • No animation support.
  • Complex shapes such as text must be drawn in Flash.
  • Only extrusion supported.

What you need:

  • Flash 3+
  • Microsoft Word 97+

Step-By-Step:

  1. Open up the drawing tools in Word.
  2. Open the 3D tools.
  3. Draw your shape. Alternately, you can draw a shape in Flash by copy/pasting the Flash shape into Word, right clicking on it, and selecting "Ungroup". TO get text into word you must make it in Flash and then completely break it apart before you copy/paste it into Word.
  4. Click the 3D on/off button.
  5. You may now manipulate the object in 3D, alter its lighting and surface properties, etc.
  6. Once you have it perfect, copy/paste it into Flash.
  7. Break the shape apart.
  8. Group it in Flash.
  9. If you want to get rid of the large gradients, you must outline the shape, then tediously get rid of all the extra lines and shapes, then fill with a nice Flash gradient.
  10. For animation, just do a stop-motion thing in Word by rotating it a little, copy/pasting it, rotating, copy/pasting, until you have the entire animation. Be forewarned that it dosen't go beyond 180 degrees, but since the object is symmetrical depth-wise (always extruded) you can work around this.