macahuna;
You don't mention what type of symbol, but paste insides translate into
masks in flash which are not supported in button symbols. Can you export as
swf from freehand? -Tom Unger

I've got a FreeHand drawing that contains a lot of compound paths (Paste
Insides). When I convert it to a symbol, the compound paths disappear; if I use
the vector art in its cut and pasted form, Flash tells me there's not enough
head space (something like that - it was four days ago when I gave up) to even
test the movie.

The imported vector artwork (940k file) will just sit on a layer and not move
or participate in the animation, other than having flow arrows pass over it. I
have no control over the size the client will want to stretch or shrink the
final movie, so I'm afraid of turning the vectors into bitmap.

Any suggestions?

macahuna;
I no longer have access to this thread through my newsreader, so I may
be forgetting some details, but it's possible that the graphic is just too
complex for your system resources. If so, you may find it " too heavy" for
flash use. Very complex vector graphics can bog down the flash player,
and/or increase the size of the swf--in such cases a rasterized version may
be preferable (if other project parameters allow for it). -Tom Unger

Thanks Tom,

I flattened the entire drawing to a single layer. An export to SWF takes about
a half-hour, but some really simple elements don't get exported (closed path
with basic fill). I still get the message about not enough stack room, even
with no animation at all!

I guess I'll just kill all the compound paths, and break the drawing down into
very basic shapes and fills. I was hoping I wouldn't have to do that. It's not
the end of the world - but I can see it from here...

Thanks again.

macahuna