Timer & Fade effect

Question

One more question then I'm done for the day.
I'm using a timer to change the index on my combobox (I'm sure there's a better way but its working) which is pulling slide data from an XML file.  I would like to crossfade between slides.  Is see there is a spark fade, but I'm unsure how to apply it to each element to work with the timer.
Timer code:
private var timer:Timer;
private function init():void
    timer = new Timer(5000);
    timer.addEventListener(TimerEvent.TIMER, onTimer);
    timer.start();
private function onTimer(evt:TimerEvent):void
    var idx:uint = dropDownList.selectedIndex;
    var max:uint = dropDownList.dataProvider.length;
    var newIdx:uint = ++idx % max;
    dropDownList.selectedIndex = newIdx;
The comboBox (yes, it used to be a drop down list)
<mx:ComboBox editable="true"
    x="10" y="10"
    id="dropDownList"
    creationComplete="dropDownList_creationCompleteHandler(event)"
    dataProvider="{getSlidesResult.lastResult}"
    labelField="number"
    visible="false" />
The items that need to have the fade effect are mx:Text, s:TextArea, mx:Image, & s:VideoPlayer.  Each has a unique ID.

Answer 1

Hi,
There are many ways you can crossfade with flex 4 I have thrown together a small example that uses a pixelbender filter to fade images and an included
a very simple text cross fade (no timers necessary). Using parallel transitions you can acheive quite a lot.
http://ezflex.net/fader/
David.