Customer Reviews

Macromedia FreeHand MX: Training from the Source

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Training from the source barely scratches the potential of Freehand MX, although it does a good job at getting a user up and running. Power Tips scattered throughout the book are a nice feature, but not much use to a Power User.

Since Macromedia has stopped shipping full manuals with Freehand MX, this title suffices as a manual, but not for people who are interested in the inner workings of Freehand, or even ideas on real world usage, and powerful insider tips to using Freehand effectively.

The name of the title, "Training from the source" just raises your expectations and this book leaves you expecting more.

As a professional who earns my income using Photoshop I was looking for help learning Macromedia Freehand MX. I understood that Freehand, similar to Photoshop is NOT intuitive.
Patti Schulze wrote and organized a "how to book" that enables the reader to reach their goal--learning Freehand MX.
The book is written in an understandable style that anticapated my questions. For example; while moving a rectangle to center it on the guides on the page, I was to drag and center the rectangle by placing the X that would appear in the center of the rectangle over the proper position on the guides. My problem was there was no X in the rectangle. The very next paragraph anticipated my question and gave the answer.
The success of your goal--learning Freehand MX takes effort on the readers part but the author has successfully done his job.

A well written introductory level course book that will also be a good reference because of the explanations at each step. It tells why you ake an action and also gives alternative ways to accomplish the same task. 4 stars instead of five because a couple of key steps were omitted in two of the exercises. I had to backtrack repeatedly until I figured out the missing steps. Recommended.

The author clearly states in the introduction the book is intended for new Freehand users. One of the previous reviews, stating it is unfit for power users, is probably correct; but that is not the intent of the book. Based on that, this book accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do: acquaint new users to Freehand. I thought it did a very good job. Additionally, the Freehand manual actually is shipped with the CD. It is located on the installation CD in .pdf format.

Macromedia Freehand MX, Training from the Source is a basic, yet, complete book for Freehand beginners. Everything you need to know to start an illustration project, either for web or print is in the book. Do not expect advanced techniques, just enough to get your imagination running. Every important tool, special effect, command or action is briefly explained. By the end of the book you WILL know how to use Macromedia Freehand!

if you like colored illustrations, the book is not for you. It has basic, right-to-the-point gray scaled illustrations, there are no complicated projects to follow. The projects are simple and, as I established earlier: for beginners.

I am an intermediate user of Dreamweaver MX 2004 as well as Fireworks and am learning Flash (for which I highly recommend the Hands On Training series) and decided I needed to learn FreeHand MX 2004, the 4th leg of the Studio MX 2004 chair. I bought this book because it was the best rated by Amazon users and I've used Training from the Source before. I was disappointed. In places the book seemed maddening (or maybe it's FreeHand MX 2004 that's maddening) and I had to go over and over some of the bits to figure out what wasn't being said in the text so I could complete the examples. In part, it maybe that the book is based on the Macintosh version (the illustration show Mac windows) and I'm working with the PC software.

Found the manual useful; there are just some things you can't figure out on your own. It was in pretty good shape, a little raggedy with, for some reason, a jillion price stickers all over it. Is there a reason you can't put the new sticker over the original for crying out loud? It arrived amazingly fast and I would absolutely go through Amazon for used books again.

I am new with FreeHand. I bought MX2004 Flash Pro and I wanted to start using all of MX2004 apps including FreeHand. This book taught me how to get me started with FH. It comes with the practice files to work my way through the lessens and I had no problem following the book. I also purchased Fireworks version of this book from the same publisher.