Flash 4! Creative Web Animation (3rd Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Laundry list of commands lacks depth
Review: I felt compelled to write a review because my experience with the book and the "interactive" tutorials on the CD-ROM was mediocre. Take the high praise you see from others, especially that which is not really backed up by specific examples, with a grain of salt.

First, about me: I'm a new Flash user who has experience creating multimedia presentations in Director. I've also taught myself Photoshop using self-help books (which, by the way, were better than this one).

The authors have taken the easy way out, giving the user a simple list of commands/actions in a reference-style manner -- yet recommend that the user read the book from front to back. This presents a problem because to read the book from front to back is boring, yet to use it as a reference gives no additional insight into the best way to create a flash project. Plus, it would take forever to complete each mini example if one were to follow the book with Flash open. Who really wants to go through the menu options of "How to rotate an object" or "How to format text?" These need to be given in context.

For example, the authors detail how to Cut or Copy an object very precisely, step by step. Useful, perhaps, if one catchs it the first time. But what if one didn't? The tutorials don't necessarily flow from the chapter and won't address everything you've learned. A great example comes right away: The Chapter 2 Quicktime tutorial includes Motion Tweening animation, yet the authors wait until chapter 10 to even address animation with paragraphs titled "How Animation Works" and "Understanding the Timeline." Obviously not very smart.

It appears that Franklin and Patton have taken the easy way out with the tutorials. These tutorials are pure movies intended for one to watch and follow at the end of each chapter, with a simultaneous Flash project on the side mimicking their actions. Where's the backup documentation? There is none. Instead, the Quicktime tutorials should be written down, progressively incorporating new tasks and skills. Did I learn from the Quicktime tutorials? Yes. But I now find myself wanting to use them as references -- and using a movie as a reference is impossible. The Flash files are there, too, but that's like trying to learn how to build an engine by examining the car after it's rolled off the assembly line. You can do it, but it takes extra work! WHY the car was built that way is still a mystery.

In summary, the authors have done a good job in writing a Flash How-to dictionary, but leave the user finishing the book without a clear sense of how to put a whole project together from beginning to end.

Rating:
Summary: Good for starting a fire
Review: The authors express when creating a Flash program, organization is the key. This book is far from organized. They spend too much time talking about things instead of doing them. Self-help books should have tons of visuals and tutorials, this lacks in both areas. The authors should have sought self-help in organizational skills before selling this book to the masses. One more thing, and this is to all authors of self-help books in any area and that is put your books in a spiral notebook form, its a real pain trying to keep the book open and do the tutorials at the same time. I won't torch it as of yet, but Chicago winters can be brutal.

Rating:
Summary: Good learning tool
Review: This book is a good one for taking you from ground zero as far as knowing how to use Flash to being comfortable with everything and creating your own stuff. I had an animation up and going (one I created myself, without tutorials) in minutes. The book covers the tools, what they're for, how they can be used pretty well. Combined with the tutorials and the help files that comes with Flash this book is a great tool to learn Flash with. This isn't a book for experienced users unless they just need a basic reference, but there is a wide range of things covered here. How to draw with Flash, sound, animation, interactivity, even putting movies on the web, or making them into gifs or jpegs for the web, it's all talked about in relatively nice detail. There are typos, however, but that's more of a minor annoyance and not much of a hinderance at all. The important information is clear enough that unless you're immensely bothered by typos, you'll enjoy this book no matter what. It's a helpful tool, but I think I'll need another, more advanced book eventually. This book has enough information and help that I should be able to go from ground zero to getting myself employed doing Flash, it's worth checking out. This isn't the sort of book (especially since Flash 5.0 just came out a few months ago) that is going to have a second edition come out, so typos and errors won't be fixed. I think it was money well-spent though, I'm a satisfied customer.

Rating:
Summary: All in all, you need this book
Review: This book is an excellent resource for learning and usingFlash! Three of my friends have used this book for learning it aswell! It gives comprehensive coverage of _all_ the commands and functions of Flash, including drawing tools, the menubar, and the Actionscript functions.

The best way to use this book is to go through the tutorials on the CD (which are immensely helpful) as you read along. In this way, it feels like you're actually being taught by someone! Great job!

The only qualm I have with F4CWA is, while every aspect of the Actionscript language is covered, and it gives a practical usage for each, I find it difficult to create some advanced effects. For instance, I download numerous .fla files on such sites as Flashkit.com which feature Actionscript. But I read the actual Actionscript though, I find that I'm lost, and am thinking, "How did they do this! "

Despite this, I still feel that this book is an excellent tutorial and reference to all Flash developers. Although this is the only Flash book I have, I have read through numerous other reviews on Amazon.com that complain about no Actionscript section at all! Therefore, I commend Derek Franklin and Brooks Patton for putting together such a useful and comprehensive book!

Highly recommended!