Others say...

"Putting the Practical before the Pedagogic and Coming up a Winner"
I e-mailed Phillip Kerman after reading his Sam's Flash 8 Professional book, and he wrote back and answered me right away. Afterwards, I went away from Flash to study Maya, and did not read Flash books anymore. After abandoning Maya (Did I say what a sucky business the movie business is? Not to mention the cost of keeping up with the hardware and software requirements as a lowly student before you even get to your first paying job - better have a rich uncle!), I am back at it with a vengeance, this time with a new version of Flash and ActionScript to learn, and with Phillip Kerman's Flash CS3 book planted firmly by my side.


It would be great if all computer books were situational. For example, "I'm trying to do this and that, here's what I've done so far, and where I'm getting stuck. Now what?" Well, gee, we've anticipated this exact problem, and the answer is printed right there on page 187 - that exact problem you're having! Would that it be so, but as far as I know, they are not currently printing books on psychic paper as of yet.


The next best thing? Really good examples of exercises and code that are useful, and not just learning for the sake of learning pedagogery, but something really practical. I mean, it might be nice to know how to capture an integer in ActionScript, return it to a parameter, and then spit it out in a trace statement, but how's that gonna help me show off my skills to a potential employer? Employers aren't impressed with manipulating integers as a rule.


After I'd had enough of the online training, and read enough of the other Flash CS3 books, I decided to create my first major Flash project. I had problems making a link from one of my buttons, and also testing my pages on my hard drive before uploading them. Not only does Phillip's book come to the rescue solving these basic problems, but it is also so easy to look up direct solutions using the book's index.


Also, his exercises are small, self-contained, easy ones to complete. As I began working on my Flash project and things started not to work, I went back to the approach of just getting one thing at a time right (as he shows in his book), and then to try integrating it into the larger project. It is much easier and less frustrating to get one thing to work properly, than to have to watch an entire Flash movie each time through just to see if last little part you added works or not. And if it doesn't, then what? Chunkify it, my friends, chunkify it! Put it into small chunks and get them to work right away. Worry about integrating them all later, when you know more about what you're doing.


Of the other major Flash CS3 books on the market, and there really aren't that many right now (Classroom in a Book, Flash CS3 Professional on Demand, and the two Visual Quickstart Guide titles) I find Phillip Kerman's book the hands-down winner, based purely on his practical approach.


Of course, it would be great to have an accomplished Flash teacher sitting there next to you while you work, but Phillip has taken the time to carefully explain how each thing works, and it is obvious that he has tested these exercises to make sure they work before publishing his book, or even sat down newbies (I strongly suspect) at the computer to go through them first to see if a total novice can get it. With other books, you get the feeling the authors are working soley out of their heads, and haven't really taken the time to show their stuff to others first to get the kind of feedback you need to really make your technical writing understandable by the general public.


Too many computer books have exercises that don't even work, or have been explained in a way that assumes prior knowledge of the program. Happily, Phillip's book does not suffer from these pitfalls. It's called doing your job as an author. My job as a reader, then, is to say thank you, and support this fine work, and encourage others to check him out.

"learned a lot but i have some issues with the book"
This is a good book that covers a lot of the basics of flash and even some action scripting. There were a few errors that I found in my book though just with pages being printed again, I emailed the publisher about it but never heard back from them. Also Mr. Kerman hasn't uploaded all the working examples yet so I was left to skip a lesson on using his frame rate calculator and skipped comparing my work to his in later chapters of the book when i was getting hung up. Those should have been up immediately after the release of this book. He will also drill into your head how to put keyframes in or the short cuts to getting menu items open. Something that could have been dropped mid book. I did learn a lot from this book, but I found myself falling asleep at points and struggling to keep my focus on the book.

"Solid learning material"
Have used this book and Mr. Kerman's Flash 8 book to get a handle on Flash. Exercises do a good job of building the knowledge and skills you need to get going. You can move at a good pace but still get a handle on what you are up against if you want to get good at Flash. This is a cut above the typical tech product book. Highly recommend.