Macromedia Flash MX 2004 Killer Tips

Any time you are absolutely unsure about what size to make your Flash movie, you can try to create all your artwork first and then crop it down. Unfortunately, cropping in Flash isn't as easy as it is in Photoshop or Fireworks, so you have to keep one thing in mind. Do your best to keep your content in the upper-left corner of the Stage because any time you resize your document, it simply shaves off or adds to the bottom and right edges of the stage.

Now, the nifty part of the process is that when you're done with your work, you can open Document Properties (CTRL-J or CMD-J) and press the Contents button. This will automatically resize your document to match what you have on the Stage and leave a little margin just in case. Maybe cropping will become easier one day, but for now, it's Match Contents.