Customer Reviews

Macromedia Flash MX 2004 Hands-On Training

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I'm a professional software developer, and I have little patience for most programming books and classes. I recently decided to learn Flash, and decided to try this book based on the "hands on" exercises. I'm completely satisfied! The descriptions and overviews are clear and well written, and the step by step exercises walk you through the important tools and techniques. I skipped a few exercises that seemed redundant, but others may want the additional reinforcement.

There's a LOT to Flash, and an intro book can't possibly cover it all. I'm already forgetting a few things from the first exercises. But based on this book, I now feel comfortable and competent to develop basic Flash animations and interactive files, and to explore further on my own.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn Flash.

Once upon a time in the world of computers, there was just a scant few languages, mostly just text displays, and the Internet the sole domain of universities. Things became complicated fast, and today it seems like you need a specific tool to do anything. Unless you spend a lot of time reading computer magazines, and just keeping up, it's hard to know what tools are useful. Flash, was a nice product to spruce up, and enhance a boring website a few years ago. It had a few extra features beyond that, but it was still just more of a niche product. How things have changed in a few years.

Today you can build many websites from the ground up with flash. It has many of the programming features of JAVA, and even subscribes to the object-oriented programming model. The animation features are now easier than ever to implement, making even the less creative among us, seem a little more artistic. It is still lacking in the world of database connectivity, but that is rumored to be coming.

This book does a nice job with Flash MX basics, expanding later to the more detailed features. As a programmer, when I first learned Windows-based programming, I had to search through hundreds of books, to find one that covered the basics. It seemed like every book assumed you already knew how to program Windows! I had programmed Macintosh, and the Windows method was much different. Here I'm thankful to get a book, which just doesn't assume I'm already a Flash Guru.

Hey, I know most of us are a bit turned off by the prospect of another, nearly 1000-page book. Still, the interactive CD ROM lessons get you up, and running quickly. The detail of the book is not just another printed reference. It's a real explanation on how to use features, step by step, and to create something. The smaller books, either only do high-level features, or cut parts they think will be seldom used. It always seems like the features they cut down on, are the ones I need to use in a project. Kudos here to the author, on writing a book that's useful, despite its massive girth.

This book makes me want the next one. There are over 100 step by step instructions in this hands on training book. It begins with a discussion of the basics, covers some tech issues with PC and Mac files (most cross platform books barely acknowledge the Mac platform), and has tons of files to learn from, play with and use in your own projects. In addition, and this is a great extra, there are many movie files that show you step by step how to complete some of the trickier activities in the book. It's amazingly helpful to watch an expert walk through the steps to a lesson or tutorial, via movies of their own screens.

From the intro and the wonderful companion website, I gathered that these books are written by actual teacher/instructors, rather than computer geeks. well, they actually are computer geeks, but they also are teachers. People with the talent and skill to actually explain and teach concepts in a structured and systematic way. I think this really contributes to the success of this book. Most of the time, the author had already anticipated my questions, and answers them somewhere in the lesson itself.

The entire book is organized into sections that build upon one another, using files and designs built around a snowboarding company. Unlike other books that use a common theme or singe site/topic to illustrate points, I didn't feel like i just learned how to create one specific kind of Flash project. Each lesson helped me understand the concepts behind the steps, so i feel comfortable in taking the skills and techniques into my own projects.

Topics include the interface, drawing, animation basics, symbols, bitmap and vector creation and manipulation, buttons, video and more advanced topics like movie clips, components and forms. It even includes a section on ActionScript basics, which is invaluable to learn if you want to move on in Flash design and creation.

All in all, I highly recommend this book for anyone who either knows a little Flash, but wants more, or for a beginner to Flash creation. With easy to read, straightforward writing and specific content geared to the novice and more experienced designer alike, Flash MX 2004 Hands On Training is one heck of a volume. Like I said, I can't wait to get my hands on the next book in the series, Flash MX 2004 Advanced H.O.T. I'd be willing to bet that any of the other books in the H.O.T. series would be as effective as this one.

This is my first review- but that is because I loved this book.

I bought foundation macromedia flash MX first- hated it, I didn't understand what I was doing. I thought I would never learn Flash.

So I bought this book (recommended by a teacher)- Flash MX 2004 HOT, this is the best book for any program I've ever read. It makes you understand why you do and use certain things. I went through the first 10 chapters in 2 days because I was having such a great time learning.

It doesn't go into detail about the features of Flash MX professional though.

This is a great book for a beginner. The tutorials are easy to read and understand, they are not too long- You'll remember what you just did- how and why. It all makes sense. I didn't have a clue about buttons in the other book-and that was with their tutorials.

This book I completely understood everything.

This book is very well written. Clear, concise and easy to follow. I don't know what the others are referring to about discrepencies. Maybe they are having trouble with comprehension.

You go from the basics to advanced techniques. I was amazed at how much I learned, even though I have been using Flash for several years. I purchased it because of the CSS instruction and to learn some of the changes in MX 2004. I was not disappointed. Yeung's background as an instructor comes through in this book. As someone who works professionally, has used Flash since v4, I HIGHLY recommend this to every beginning/intermediate Flash developer.

I bought the "Training From the Source" Flash MX 2004 book first. Boy, was that book a pain! I had to slog through numerous detailed examples of creating user interface graphics and buttons before ever getting to animate anything. That book is wayyyy too detailed and focused on one application - creating a UI for a "rich application" web site. Also, the book is often inaccurate, especially for Mac users. I was ready to forget about Flash forever.

So, I bought this book, and it turned me totally around. I can't believe how much difference a book can make in revealing the beauty of a piece of software. It starts right out with animation, and it is aimed at the right level of detail (at least for me). Also, it has very effective sidebars to thoroughly explain concepts as they come up, so it can be used as a reference (unlike the other book). Thanks, Rosanna!

The author has demonstrated great skill in presenting the general concepts for using Flash MX 2004. This book is excellent for the person who needs to know both how and why to do things in Flash. When you finish the book, you should have no trouble understanding how to use Flash at an intermediate level.

In regard to the writing style, very rarely did I encounter explanations that made assumptions about the reader's understanding of the hands-on process. The author knows how to use English well enough so that technical concepts are understood. Usually, many authors of most technical manuals are generally incapable of explaining a topic without utterly confusing the reader, which seems to come mostly from making assumptions. You will not encounter that in this book.

I got this book because, after using Adobe PhotoShop and Dreamweaver for a while, I had decided I wanted to design my pages completely in Flash. I had gotten quite a few books on DW and Photoshop and found myself performing many tasks easily after a short while. Unfortunately, I didn't get that out of Flash MX Hands On Training. THat's not to say that the book is worthless. The exercises included with the accompanying CD are good. However, I think the author focuses too much on you completing the exercises rather than explaining to you what you are doing and for what reason. THe author will take you step by step through the exercises but does not provide the proper background to actually do it without the exercises. I found myself repeating the exercises a number of times and still not getting down the basic task. That is, I couldn't do a number of the things even after having gone through the exercises because I feel the author spends too much time telling you what you have to do to complete the exercise. After going through the book and doing almost every exercise, I actually got discouraged and decided not to continue with Flash. However, I decided I would go with one of the other books out there and see what they have to offer.
Based on my experience I would have to not recommend the book.

I just recieved Flash MX 2004 HOT in the mail Dec. 31, 2003 - right on time for 2004 :) Thanks!!! I would had purchased the MX2004 Flash Bible, but its not available yet. Instead, I purchased Rosanna Yeung's user friendly book. One of the first things I did when I opened up the book was pop in the included tutorial CD that is loaded with wonderful examples and exercises. I especially enjoyed Rosanna's Quicktime tutorial movies relating to basic Action Script (controlMC.mov, loadMovieNum.mov, menu.mov, motionGuide.mov, musicSelector.mov, mutplShpTwn.mov, onion.mov, stop_play_actions.mov, stopAndPlay.mov, stopAndPlayMC.mov). The final Xboarding site .swf example pulls all the tutorials together... Nice Job! I would have enjoyed an additional chapter pertaining to .xml, as this seems to be essential knowledge for dynamic content, i.e. sound files, video, picts... etc. Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a user friendly guide. Thanks again!

I just purchased this title two weeks ago and I've been working steadily through the Hands-on exercises to learn more about Flash MX 2004. I'm a web developer selling custom websites to Home Builders and have to learn Flash in order to stay competitive.

The text is easy-to-follow, covers all the basics in enough detail for the exercises to be completed in sequence, and the files on the included CD-ROM are first rate, with excellent graphics and animations. A lot of thought and effort has gone into this title which counts 953 pages.

If you are having to open existing .fla files to attempt to modify them for clients, or you've invested in Macromedia's Flash and don't find enough information in the Help screens and basic tutorial bundled with the software (you won't, it's not there), then this is the text to buy.

After working with this for 10 days, I'm over 400 pages into the exercises and have already purchased the companion volume to this title "Flash MX 2004 Beyond the Basics HOT". I don't often publish reviews of books, but read them online prior to making purchases, which is why I'm adding my 5-star rating to this title. An excellent, well-written book for any skill level developer who wants to learn Flash MX 2004.