Flash 5 Visual Insight
Authors: Sherry London, Dan London
Venue:  (2000)

From the Book:About Macromedia Flash 5 Flash was originally released as FutureSplash and was the first program to animate vector output for the Web. Macromedia purchased the program and has been making waves with it since. Flash has taken the Web by storm. It provides a cross-platform, browser-independent way to generate interactive animations that have a small file size. Unlike dynamic HTML, Flash plays anywhere that the Flash plugin is installed. The Flash plugin is readily available and used in over 80 percent of Web browsers installed on user machines. In Flash 4, Macromedia introduced a scripting language with conditional if statements to enable programmers to create more interactive Flash sites. In Flash 5, Macromedia has enhanced the language (called ActionScript) and given it new Java-like syntax, making it much more accessible and powerful for experienced programmers. For graphic artists, Flash 5 introduces the Bézier Pen, which makes shapes much easier to edit. Who Needs This Book If you're just getting started with Flash site design, this book will take you from the most basic necessities as far as you can go without having to become a programmer. The book is aimed at graphics folks, and shows how to create animated content for sites. Although you'll learn a little bit about using simple Actions, no programming skills are required. If you do need to (or want to) learn Flash programming, Coriolis also publishes Flash ActionScript f/x and Design, which provides a more in-depth look at ActionScript. Visual Insight Philosophy The Visual Insight series of books from Coriolis is geared to presenting practical knowledge in a visually appealing format that makes learning easy. Each process in the book is clearly described step by step, and each step is carefully illustrated to show exactly how to accomplish the tasks involved. The Visual Insight books are presented in a two-column format, with steps listed on the left side of the page and the accompanying figures on the right side, next to the steps they illustrate. The steps get right to the point, making sure that you waste no time in getting done what you need to get done. This Book's Structure This book is composed of two parts. Part I, Techniques and Tasks, is composed of Chapters 1 through 9. This part deals with the nitty-gritty details of working with Flash. Part I presents, in down-to-earth language, the precise methods and procedures you need to follow to make Flash do what you want. Each chapter's topic is progressively more advanced, beginning with a chapter on understanding the Flash user interface and leading up to a chapter on publishing and optimizing Web sites with Flash. Part II, Projects, is composed of Chapters 10 through 15. This part contains a series of projects that expand on the knowledge gained in Part I. Each project deals with how to use Flash to solve common real-life Web-design situations, such as creating custom Web pages, working with layers, creating buttons, and making drop-down menus. Flash "newbies" are probably best off starting with Chapter 1 and working their way through the book chapter by chapter. Other users might want to dive into the table of contents or index and go right to the areas that they need to use right away. In either case, this book is designed to give you a good grounding in Flash 5. Turn the page, and begin creating.