Macromedia Flash MX: A Beginner's Guide (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Some people have a talent for being able to make new material easy to understand. With over 60 books under his belt, Brian Underdahl is definitely one of them. In Macromedia Flash MX: A Beginner’s Guide, he writes in a friendly yet concise style that makes learning Flash MX, including the rudiments of ActionScript, as easy as putting one foot in front of the other.

The book covers the basic concepts behind Flash--learning the work environment; drawing; creating animations; using motion guides, masks, symbols, imported graphics, and sound; publishing movies; and using ActionScript. If you’ve been resistant to learning the latter up until now, this book may be just the one that gets you started programming your movies with interactivity.

The book moves you along by keeping you thinking, doing, and recapping what you’ve just learned. There are lots of mini-projects for hands-on learning. In fact, by page 22, you’ve gotten your feet wet with a simple animation. Each of the book’s 14 chapters begins with a set of goals and ends with a "Mastery Check" with which you can test your comprehension. And there are pop quizzes on almost every page. Although they may seem elementary, these tests help you learn with confidence and know when it’s safe to skip ahead.

"Ask the Expert" sidebars seem to anticipate readers’ questions. For example, "I opened the Insert menu, and I see there is also a Blank Keyframe command. Why would I choose this command rather than the Keyframe command?" The strict answer would be "When you want to insert a frame that doesn’t copy the contents of the previous keyframe." But Underdahl’s answer goes one step further and lets you know that, most likely, you won’t want to choose a blank keyframe because you’ll probably want to manipulate the previous keyframe’s contents in order to animate them.

In other words, this beginner’s guide doesn’t just define features and tools; it lets you know why you might need them and how they may be useful to you. A good teacher shows what’s possible--and Brian Underdahl is a very good teacher. --Angelynn Grant

Product Description

Taking it from the top, learn all the Flash skills you'll need to create fun, interesting, and compelling Web site copy. Critically acclaimed author Brian Underdahl adeptly guides you through working with sound, motion, text and animation.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 402 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill/OsborneMedia; annotated edition edition (March 22, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0072222662
• ISBN-13: 978-0072222661
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,333,985 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Easy to Read and Understand, May 2, 2002

By A Customer

After looking at a friend's Flash-filled website, I knew I had to learn Flash for myself. This was a great book to get started. First, all the examples actually work. Second, I was able to understand why things worked as I followed along. The author is really good at breaking down complexity into simple, clear examples, then re-combining the examples into something complex that is simple to do and understand. Flash MX is such a versatile tool that I was perplexed learning it from scratch without a book that could unravel the complexity. This one does it in quick, simple steps. As a beginner I thought I was starting out slow, learning to use one tool at a time, but suddenly I was working with layers, timelines, tweens and motion guides making smooth animations flow across the screen, and it all made sense. Actually, I felt the sort of let-down you feel when someone explains a magic trick to you: "Aww, you mean it's that easy?!" Halfway into the book I was animating graphics from my digital camera and recording and using sound effects. I usually have a hard time following "cook book" how-to manuals because I want to know why and how things work, not just what sequence of buttons to push. The author breaks down all the technical pieces into short, sweet paragraphs leading into each exercise, so I knew what was happening technically with each step. There is all the information necessary for publishing Flash animations to the Web and experimenting to find that critical compromise between bandwidth and detail. The book goes easily through tools like the bandwidth profiler and preloaders, to tailor smooth animation at modem speeds. There is lots of detail on using ActionScript to make some very professional looking effects. I found this book useful both because it has all the detail to make every exercise work right the first time - there are few manuals I can say that about! - and because it is really easy to read, with just enough information about the nitty-gritty inner workings of web animation to make learning Flash a comfortable experience. I would recommend this book without question for beginners, and to anyone who uses the basics of Flash and wants to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the tools that are available, that they haven't yet used, because each module stands on its own, so you can skip the familiar parts and pick up where you need to start learning.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great for Flash, not Flash MX, April 24, 2002

By	Calvin T. Neely (LaGrange, GA United States) - See all my reviews

After attending a Macromedia presentation on FLASH MX I was eager to get a book to learn more about it. I was familiar with Flash 5, but certainly no expert. I got this book after working with Flash MX for about one week. The first thing I noticed is the book is well written and organized. Each chapter has a project at the end that covers everything you learned in the chapter, or module. However, it looks like a book written for Flash 5 with a few, very few, comments thrown in for MX. There is only one small paragraph about the new Components in MX, a big change from Flash 5. There is nothing even mentioned about Distributing to Layers, another new and great feature of MX.
I like the book and will keep it for a general reference for FLASH. However, I am looking for another book now that is specific to MX. If you are totally new to FLASH, then this is a great book. If you are looking for something with specifics to MX, look some more.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Learn Flash MX with Ease, March 29, 2002

By A Customer

I am trying to learn Flash because I have heard all of the hype. I have built some pretty basic web pages in the past, but I am interested in creating more exciting content. However, when I got the software, I was basically lost. I just couldn't get a handle on all of the concepts. This book has been a great help. Everything is super clear, and the author organized the book in a very logical manner. I am really pleased with this book. Better yet, you can download all of the working files that the author created for the book.