Shall We Learn

In our previous lesson, we added beat to our dancer sprite. In Lesson 4, I will show you how to add interactions between two sprites.

Download the starting project HERE.

View the PDF version of this lesson HERE.

Step 1: Create a Music Sprite

Let’s create a Music Sprite or a sprite that controls playing and stopping of background music. To create a new sprite, click to open Paint Editor.

Instead of drawing our own, this time we will import an image. Click “Import”.

Click “Costumes” if it’s not already selected. Then open “Things” folders.

Select “drum1” or whatever image you like. Then click “OK” to save.

Rename this new sprite to “hip-pop”. It’s seems big for me so I shrink it with “Shrink Sprite” tool.

Then use “Move” tool to move the “hip-pop” sprite to wherever you see fit. I place it next to dancer1’s feet.

Step 2: Move Music Loop to the Music Sprite

Drag the Music Combo Block from dancer1’s Scripts Tab.

Drop it to be over sprite “hip-pop” icon. Wait until the “hip-pop” sprite is highlighted before releasing the mouse.

Sprite “hip-pop” now has the music combo block from “dancer1”. Delete this same combo block from “dancer1”.

Then, IMPORT all three music clips to hip-pop sprite by selecting it from Sprite list, clicking Sound tab, clicking Import button, and selecting Music Loop folder to browse to these three music clips: DrumMachine, HumanBeatbox1, and HipHop.

Step 3: Turn Music On and Off

To turn music on and off, we need to create a virtual switch. Like a real switch, a virtual switch can be on or off. To create a virtual switch, we use Variables. Select “Variables” Tool Box, and click “Make a variable” button. Then enter “switch” for Variable name.

I would like this switch to work this way:

For this switch to work, we need following blocks:

• one block from tool kit

• one block from tool kit

• one block from tool kit

For sprite, we will add three new combo blocks. The first combo block turns the switch ON (set music on to 1) when is clicked.

The second combo block turns the switch ON again (set music on to 1) when “hip-pop” is clicked.

Finally, the third combo block keeps checking if the switch is OFF (switch = 0). If OFF, then stops all sounds.

For sprite, we will add one combo block. This combo block will turns the switch OFF if “dancer1” is clicked.

Your “dancer1” sprite should have these combo blocks.

Your “hip-pop” sprite should have these combo blocks.

Download the result project HERE.

View the PDF version of this lesson HERE.

TAKE A BREAK. I WILL SEE YOU IN LESSON 5.