New Component: ClipClone
(3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
Loading ...Have you ever wanted to duplicate a movie clip or shape many times over and over in your movie? Although this can be done reasonably easily using the standard copy / paste commands, the new component “ClipClone” may speed up the process significantly.
ClipClone also allows you to duplicate a movie clip or shape into various patterns including: Horizontal, Vertical, Ellipse, Random, Sine and Line. For some patterns (Ellipse, Random and Sine) it is possible to orient the movie clip or shape according to its position. In addition, it is possible to delay any effect associated with the object so that the effects are applied to each of the duplicated objects in sequence.
This component will work with Max3 and MiniMax3 with build dates of 20090904 or later, and although the component is not included with the 20090904 build’s installer, it can be download here. After downloading it, extract both files within the zip file to:
C:\Program Files\SWiSH Max3\Components\Utility
Note that the exact location may be different depending on where you installed Max3, or MiniMax3. We intend including the component in future releases of Max3 and MiniMax3.
Using ClipClone
Drag the component from the Utility area of the components tree onto the stage.
Open the Parameters panel. If the panel is not visible, enable it using the main menu option Window.
Set the Number of Items parameter in the parameters panel to 1.
In the Outline panel, expand the ClipClone movie clip and delete the existing shape. 
Then draw the shape / move clip that you wish to have duplicated so that it replaces the position of the original shape. If you wish to add an effect (eg. fade-in), add the effect to your shape / movie clip before altering the ClipClone parameters.
Now adjust the parameters for the ClipClone component to cause your movie clip to be duplicated.
Altering Number of Items will cause the movie clip to be duplicated so that the total number of objects is equal to the parameter Number of Items. The original movie clip will appear as the top most object.
The parameters for ClipClone are discussed in the table below.
| Parameter | Description |
| Number of Items | Enter the total number of items |
| Arrangement | One of Horizontal, Vertical, Ellipse, Random, Sine or Line |
| A | Use depends on Arrangement. Horizontal and Vertical=Number of items per line. Ellipse, Random and Sine=Width. Line=Length of line. |
| B | Use depends on Arrangement. Horizontal and Vertical=Space between items. Ellipse, Random and Sine=Height. Line=Angle of line. |
| Align with curve | If checkbox is set, the object is aligned if Arrangement is Ellipse, Random, Sine or Line. |
| Effect Delay | Offset of the start of the effects from the previous object. |
If you alter any of the parameters, all of the movie clips other than the 1st will be deleted and then re-created according to the newly set parameters.
If the original shape / movie clip has a name then the duplicated items will have N appended to their name where N goes from 2 to the total number of items. For example, if your movie clip is named “mymovieclip”, the original item will retain its name of mymovieclip, but the first copied object will be mymovieclip2, the next object will be mymovieclip3 etc.
An example movie showing the different variations can be seen below. Press the Next button to see a different example.
Both example files can be downloaded from here.
[...] in our forums. However an easy method of creation was not possible until the introduction of the ClipClone component. Cogs are often used to symbolize a number of things, for example: machinery, technology, [...]