0.16 Sound in actionscript  (Page 2/8)

General background information

A sound in ActionScript is represented by an object of the class named Sound .

When the information encapsulated in a Sound object is played , that process is represented by an object of the class named SoundChannel .

According to the documentation :

"The Sound class lets you work with sound in an application. The Sound class lets you create a new Sound object, load and play an external MP3file into that object, close the sound stream, and access data about the sound, such as information about the number of bytes in the stream and ID3 metadata.More detailed control of the sound is performed through the sound source -- the SoundChannel or Microphone object for the sound -- and through the properties inthe SoundTransform class that control the output of the sound to the computer's speakers."

The program that I will explain in this lesson makes use of events and methods of the Sound class and the SoundChannel class.

You will find a lot of interesting and useful information in the document titled Basics of working with sound on the Adobe website, including the following:

"Although there are various sound file formats used to encode digital audio, ActionScript 3.0 and Flash Player support sound files that arestored in the mp3 format. They cannot directly load or play sound files in other formats like WAV or AIFF."

A variety of different sound file converter programs are available on the web that can be used to convert other sound file formats into mp3 format.

Preview

Run the ActionScript program named Sound03

If you have the Flash Player plug-in (version 10 or later) installed in your browser, click here to run the program named Sound03 .

If you don't have the proper Flash Player installed, you should be notified of that fact and given an opportunity to download and install the Flash Playerplug-in program.

Demonstrates the use of sound with ActionScript

This project is intended to demonstrate the use of sound with ActionScript. It also displays the image of a cloudy sky shown in Figure 1, but the only purpose of the image is to make it obvious when the program starts running.

Figure

Sound03 image.

Stormy weather

The project is designed to give you the impression of the sounds that you might hear while sitting on your covered deck looking at the sky during a thunderstorm.

Four stormy-weather sounds

The project plays the following sounds extracted from mp3 files:

• rain
• wind
• sizzle
• thunder

The rain sound is continuous.

The wind sound is played on startup and then occasionally thereafter on the basis of a random number generator.

The sizzle sound is also played occasionally on the basis of a random number generator. (You will probably need to be patient to hear this sound because it isn't played very often.) As soon as the sizzle sound finishes, the sound of a thunder clap is played.

Discussion and sample code

The project file structure

The final project file structure, captured from the FlashDevelop project window, is shown in Figure 2.