You¿ve seen its potential¿its new extensible architecture, its faster run-time performance, its redesigned interface. Now it¿s time to tap it! When you¿re ready to sit down with a trusted instructor and learn the ins and outs of Macromedia¿s extensive upgrade to its popular interactive tool Flash MX 2004, this is the place to turn. Using lessons based on real-life projects, this friendly guide takes you by the hand and leads you through the world of Flash MX 2004, covering its new interface, its drawing and color tools, animation basics, symbols and instances, motion, bitmaps, buttons, movie clips, ActionScript, sound, components and forms, video, and more. You can follow the book¿s clear, step-by-step exercises at your own pace and view the techniques in action on the accompanying CD¿s QuickTime tutorials. (The CD also includes project and sample files.) In next to no time, you¿ll be integrating video, text, audio, and graphics into immersive, rich experiences with Flash MX 2004.

You’ve seen its potential?its new extensible architecture, its faster run-time performance, its redesigned interface. Now it’s time to tap it! When you’re ready to sit down with a trusted instructor and learn the ins and outs of Macromedia’s extensive upgrade to its popular interactive tool Flash MX 2004, this is the place to turn. Using lessons based on real-life projects, this friendly guide takes you by the hand and leads you through the world of Flash MX 2004, covering its new interface, its drawing and color tools, animation basics, symbols and instances, motion, bitmaps, buttons, movie clips, ActionScript, sound, components and forms, video, and more. You can follow the book’s clear, step-by-step exercises at your own pace and view the techniques in action on the accompanying CD’s QuickTime tutorials. (The CD also includes project and sample files.) In next to no time, you’ll be integrating video, text, audio, and graphics into immersive, rich experiences with Flash MX 2004.

You’ve seen its potential—its new extensible architecture, its faster run-time performance, its redesigned interface. Now it’s time to tap it! When you’re ready to sit down with a trusted instructor and learn the ins and outs of Macromedia’s extensive upgrade to its popular interactive tool Flash MX 2004, this is the place to turn. Using lessons based on real-life projects, this friendly guide takes you by the hand and leads you through the world of Flash MX 2004, covering its new interface, its drawing and color tools, animation basics, symbols and instances, motion, bitmaps, buttons, movie clips, ActionScript, sound, components and forms, video, and more. You can follow the book’s clear, step-by-step exercises at your own pace and view the techniques in action on the accompanying CD’s QuickTime tutorials. (The CD also includes project and sample files.) In next to no time, you’ll be integrating video, text, audio, and graphics into immersive, rich experiences with Flash MX 2004.

Great for Beginners
This is really an absolute must for beginners. I am 76 and have been using computers for a few years and wanted to learn doing web sites. I just wish they had a book like this to learm Dreamweaver and it would have been easy to learn. When I went to learn Flash it was easy and all I can say is WOW. You can learn Flash easily with this book. If you really want to learn Flash and you are a beginner this is the book.

Best of its kind
I’ve learned a whole raft of software by following the lessons in assorted books, but I must say this one topped the lot. I’m reasonably savvy at website work (I use Dreamweaver and Fireworks) and wanted to introduce some animation on our website, so it’s time to begin learning Flash. This book is incredibly easy to follow (tells you what it’s going to tell you, then tells you, and then tells you what it told you), puts everything in the right sequence, and gives context or big-picture explanations exactly when they’re needed. Outstanding.

The Flash Book For You
Excellent book! Clear, straight-forward, and specific. Flash is not an easy program, but this book makes it less frustrating by providing step-by-step instructions. I’m a beginning Flash developer and this book has been a god-send.

Joe Okonkwo

GREAT Way to Learn Flash
Over the last two years, I’ve purchased a few Flash books in the hopes of learning the tool and spicing up my website. For some reason, the materials never delivered on their promises and I ended up going with SwishMax in a pinch. This book does a GREAT job in teaching the materials...much better than I’ve experienced in the past. Now that I’m comfortable with Flash, I’ve put SwishMax back on the shelf.

BTW, I’m an IT project manager with 30 years experience and I just turned 60...never stop learning.

Clear, concise - excellent textbook!
I made the mistake of buying another Flash textbook without reading the reviews here. Big mistake! After two failed attempts at muddling through the text - I began to think that Flash was impossible to learn. I spent many hours following lessons without knowing what I was doing or why. And the book was full of technical errors, so often the lessons weren’t even possible to follow.

I decided to give Flash one last chance. Based on the glowing reviews here I chose this Yeung / Weinman text.

What a difference!!! I feel like I’m not even using the same software. Within just a few minutes of reading this book I understood things about Flash that I didn’t understand after many hours with the other book. Within hours I was creating my own animations with ease!

For a beginner, this book is clear, easy to follow and most importantly it helps you to really understand the concepts behind what you’re doing.

I would recommend this to anyone.

Another helpful reference from Peachpit
Being in the media business, I’ve had the opportunity to use a myriad of software manuals and references. I have always found Peachpit Press offers clear, concise guides that bring you up to speed fast. Flash MX 2004 Hands-On Training is no exception. The only reason this book didn’t get a five-star rating is because I love lots of free extras when the manual comes with a companion CD and this one came up lighter than I would have liked.

From Nincompoop to Ninja
This book helped me to prep a class I was asked to teach in Flash when I barely knew any! More than that, it was a pleasure to learn from it, the step-by-step instructions were meaningful and complete, and now I really enjoy working in Flash rather than dreading it. I recommend purchasing this book to anyone interested in learning Flash: each page is money very well spent!

Macromedia Flash MX 2004 HOT
This is an excellent book for both beginners and those who have some Flash knowledge. The lessons are easy to read/understand and flow very nicely in a step-by-step manner to guide you through. I have previous experience with Flash MX and found this book very helpful in giving me further understanding of the software.

more windows friendly than macintosh friendly
As a macintosh friendly graphic designer who has recently started to explore being a web designer I wanted to learn Flash. Having really liked the Lynda Weinman series / H.O.T. books I was quite excited to get this book. Didn’t mind too much about it being for both Windows & Macintosh users. However, I was quite disappointed to find as many macintosh errors as I did. One example in Ch. 16 "Publishing & Exporting" and publishing a projector file the author instructs to change the extention for the Macintosh Projector type to add the ".hqx" instead of leaving it as the default name of "Projector." Then instructs for mac users to double click on the .hqx document to open it to see the projector file that we were to have successfully created in this exercise. Got an error message stating that the file did "not appear to be compressed or encoded..." Now perhaps my expansion software isn’t working properly or something like that but when I used the default name for a Macintosh file of simply "projector" without adding any extensions it worked. There were a few other macintosh errors in previous chapters. Point is... while I really enjoyed this book and got a lot out of all the exercises, learned tons, etc. I felt that some of the Macintosh aspects could have been better resolved. Seemed to be more focused on Windows users.

This book taught me Flash- and I loved doing it
I realized recently that I wanted to learn to use Flash in my websites. I had tried messed around with Flash and working my way through the Flash Bible with little success... but when I turned to this book it all clicked for me.

The good-

* The author writes in plain, easy to understand english, and explains exactly what you are doing and why in each step.

* Impressive examples. After you finish a project and check it out in action, you’ll be pleased and proud of what you’ve accomplished.

* The book’s 18 chapters cover a ton of material, beginning with the very first steps, such as using the tools and the timeline, to the later chapters involving adding audio and video to your project, publishing and hosting it on the web.

The bad-

* I would have liked to have had more information on actionscript. There is a fair amount of it covered in this book, including one large chapter, but I would have liked even more. The author states several times that some of the scripting is "beyond the scope of this book".

* Sometimes instructions are repeated over and over throughout the chapters, to the point of overkill. After a few chapters, I know how to hit return to move to a new line in the actionscript and no longer need a picture to show me.

* I got really sick of the repeated snowboarding project examples in every single chapter. Mix it up a little, will ya? Some of us are skiiers.

Overall these are very minor complaints, because the book truly is an amazing success and a terrific resource. I would whole-heartedly recommend that any person just starting in Flash USE THIS BOOK.

Macromedia Flash MX-HOT
Good tutorial style book for beginners. Learn Flash step by step. the only downfall was I couldn’t use it as a reference and just pick it up and look how to do something unless I did the exercise.

Learn Flash in a Hurry
I’m a graphic designer, I learned Flash with this book. Great tutorial with hands on training discs and pictures throughout to help you along. I would recommend this book to any designer wanting to learn Flash!

Good Tutorial for Beginners
This book is a good tutorial for the beginner but if you just want a quick reference book, it’s not the book for you.

Excellent reference to get started with Flash MX 2004
I just purchased this title two weeks ago and I’ve been working steadily through the Hands-on exercises to learn more about Flash MX 2004. I’m a web developer selling custom websites to Home Builders and have to learn Flash in order to stay competitive.

The text is easy-to-follow, covers all the basics in enough detail for the exercises to be completed in sequence, and the files on the included CD-ROM are first rate, with excellent graphics and animations. A lot of thought and effort has gone into this title which counts 953 pages.

If you are having to open existing .fla files to attempt to modify them for clients, or you’ve invested in Macromedia’s Flash and don’t find enough information in the Help screens and basic tutorial bundled with the software (you won’t, it’s not there), then this is the text to buy.

After working with this for 10 days, I’m over 400 pages into the exercises and have already purchased the companion volume to this title "Flash MX 2004 Beyond the Basics HOT". I don’t often publish reviews of books, but read them online prior to making purchases, which is why I’m adding my 5-star rating to this title. An excellent, well-written book for any skill level developer who wants to learn Flash MX 2004.

Flash MX 2004
This book is great. It is well written and the included example cd is really helpful.

By Far the BEST Book for Learning Flash MX ’04
As always, Lynda.com delivers! I have yet to use one of their products that don’t leave me with a decidedly positive feeling that I’m in the hands of a true professional. Lynda hit upon a brilliant concept by getting actual instructors to write these books, and she was really smart to get a hold of Ms. Rosanna Yeung. As I indicated in the title, this is by far the BEST book that I have come across to either learn, brush-up on, or reference Macromedia’s Flash MX 2004. But what makes it so great? Let me tell you!

Firstly, beginners will find this book easy to pick up and learn. It is devoid of the typical long-winded banter that normally accompanies software training titles. The lessons are arranged in a logical order that allows the learner to gradually build upon what they have learned up to that point. If the learner should help to become confused about a certain exercise, they are reinforced with reference images, a repetition of previously learned concepts, and an excellent index in the back of the book. However, I doubt this could happen given how well the book was developed. I also observed that every single time a question occurred to me as to when a topic would be covered; the author answered it soon thereafter.

Secondly, the book is an excellent text for the intermediate user -- like me -- who wants to brush up on their skills. I have not used Flash since version 5, and had difficulty grasping some of the new concepts. However, because of the fine manner in which this book was written, I was able to quickly get up to speed with a minimal amount of headache. Between the help files that come with Flash and this book, I cannot imagine anyone who has prior experience with the software being unable to get back into the program. The table of contents are laid out in such a way that an intermediate user can pick and choose as to what areas they want to focus on. Furthermore, it is quite fun -- if you’ve a great like of graphics imaging program -- to go through the exercises from beginning to end.

Thirdly, and lastly, the book is also a great reference resource for the advanced user who has not quite achieved the elevated status of Flash "Guru." Let’s face it -- Macromedia Flash is one hell of a big program, and with the advent of ActionScript 2.0, it has changed somewhat. More experienced advanced users can occasionally forget a step, and this book is a wonderful resource to get them back on track. The index and table of contents -- as previously mentioned -- are organized in such a manner, that one should not find it too difficult to find what they are looking for.

Being a multimedia instructional designer, I am pleasantly surprised at the smooth flow of the lessons and the way in which the book was laid out. There are no points in the book in which the student will be left exclaiming, "Hey! Wait a second we never went over this!" or "Whoa, whoa, whoa... Slow down now." This book can also serve as a resource for instructors who may be experiencing difficulty developing a lesson plan for Flash. (Yes! It’s that well written!)

Overall, and this is rare for me, I have to give this book five out of five stars...

Not to mention the fact that the author is beautiful, and there’s nothing more provocative than a techno-geek with a pretty head on her shoulders. Ms. Yeung - you rock!

Great start to a great technology
This books covers the basics with many practical example done in the H.O.T. fashion. Really worth it if you want to get serious. The information and excercises in the book provide a good practice run for the design certification exam.

great book!!!
this is an amzing book, and the delivery was very fast, i ordered it on Sunday and it arrive on Wednesday!!!! In perfect condition. Very good!!!!

A helpful in instruction manual
I am currently taking classes on graphic design, and was instructed that this would be a helpful manual in helping to learn how to use the flash animation system. I was instructed that this is the best manual out there.

Good for Beginners
I bought this text after getting very frustrated with Macromedia’s awful documentation, I had no prior Flash experience, and very little graphics/animation experience.

The author made a great effort to present clear examples and demonstrate fundamental flash concepts. The text is a series of tutorials (and lots of them), with a new concept usually introduced and explained in each one.

While I now have a decent grasp on the fundamentals of flash and basic actionscript, I found it took too long to get through the text. Some examples go overboard with too much detail, at times its a bit frustrating.

The CD includes a few video lessons for some of the exercises (and of course the files for each exercise), but the video’s aren’t presented very well. Most exercises do not have video lessons.
If someone were to a video based series, it would cut the learning time by about 70%.

The HOT books do it again
Well, I learn by doing, and these books are a hit in my opinion.

It DOES start a little slow, but it works its way up, and all in all, I learned a LOT. I had NO experience in Flash. I’m a programmer by trade. After this book, I was able to hit the action-script tutorial online, as well as the Flash/PHP tutorials, and had no problem understanding what was going on. I just bought the "Beyond The Basics" book, and plan to go through it next.

Only buy it if it’s required
Ya know, I’m up to chapter 5 in my class that uses this book, and it hasn’t taught me anything that I couldn’t have learned on my own via online flash tutorials. Sure, it may have required me getting on google and searching (god forbid), but come on.

I can only recommend this if you need it for a class, and even so, you can probably find it on an auction site. $40 is too much IMO, and considering it only comes with a 30-day trial of the program (which I’m sure you can get elsewhere for free), it’s plain not worth it considering you can find it elsewhere. Buy the student version of the program and find the book on an auction site.

A very good computer book
I am amazed at how many people review computer books and give them low ratings for something the books never stated they would do. If you want to learn programming, this book is not for you. If you want a reference book you can go back to, this book might be helpful, but other books may be better (I am also amazed at how many people try to use learning materials as reference manuals and reference manuals as learning materials). If you want to learn to create files from scatch, this book is not for you (personally, I would rather learn how to animate the snowflakes in chapter 6 rather than starting from nothing and wasting time drawing a snowflake from scratch).

This author never claims the reader will learn programming, that the book should be used as a reference, or that readers will create files from scratch, so why evaluate the book on those criteria? It is like buying an SUV and then being disappointed with it because it gets low gas mileage.

The author’s goal for this book is clear - to learn to create flash animations and interactive files. In that regard, I thought the book was a huge success! I have gone through many computer books dealing with many applications (Access, Filemaker, Excel, SPSS, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, InDesign, and Illustrator to name a few), and this was easily one of the best. If your goal is to learn Flash quickly, then I highly recommend this book.

almost too basic
I bought this book having some knowledge of Flash. This book is almost too basic. If you have some knowledge of Flash and are comfortable with making basic pages, then this book may not be what you are looking for. If you have no experience using Flash and are truly a newbie, this is the book for you.
It is well laid out and easy to use. The index is great and makes things very easy to find. But definitely would not recommend this book for those with basic knowledge of this program.
I would probably go with "Beyond the Basics" or something else if you have some knowledge -- even minimal.

Purchase if you have some Flash and Programming Background
The writing style is great, and the exercises are explained in detail leaving nothing out. If you have no experience with programming then you will have a hard time understanding what is going on, although Shane explains each step you are dealing in programming concepts. If you want to keep your file size down and your design, module in nature, this is the book for you. You are taken through one complete web project which incorporates such activities as CSS, shared libraries, and seperate swf files loaded using the new action script. I felt loading the variables using LoadVars was going a bit far for an intermediate book, still 4 stars, and all the concepts you learn are important.

Do Not Purchase
I am completely new to Flash and I only purchased the book because it was recommended by an instructor. I hated each exercise since it started with an already created file. Every exercise should begin with "open a new file" and not one that contains at least half of the exercise requirements already completed. I wasted a lot of time trying to recreate what the author required only to discover that she eliminated some very simple but essential mouse clicks. A bulleted list of instructions would be a much better presentation of the instructions because of the many steps in each exercise.
I know that there are other published books that will teach the beginner much much better than this one will.

*Not* for those with programming backgrounds.
First off, please let me say that this is one of the prettiest books to grace my bookcase. One can tell that it has been painstakingly designed from cover to cover, and it is, no doubt, of quality craftsmanship.

Why must I give it only 2 stars, you ask? Despite being an eye-catching book, it frustrates the bejesus out of me. I aspire from a graphics background (with increasing emphasis on programming (java, PHP, JSP)), so I know my way around the industry standard apps (PS, Illustrator, Fireworks, Dreamweaver). This book, however, lays things out in such a bizarre manner, that unless one intends on reading the piece in its entirety in a linear fashion, it will undoubtedly prove little referencial value (I tend to skip around because I don’t need to re-learn how the straigt-line tool works).

For those who tend to favor the O’Reilly series of books, you will most likely wish you would have spent the money on getting drunk, because even though both choices will leave you with a headache, at least booze provides several hours of enjoyment before becoming sickening.

My suggestion would be to go with the "Unleashed" book by SAMS. It is much more reference oriented, and includes a semi-exhaustive actionscript primer.

Disclaimer: From the looks of the current rating (4.5/5 stars) I would be the outlier, so this book might be great for you.

Macromedia Flash MX 2004 Hands-on Training
Book was received in a very timely manner. The Professor that ordered the book is very please with it.

Good...if you have the time
I got this book because, after using Adobe PhotoShop and Dreamweaver for a while, I had decided I wanted to design my pages completely in Flash. I had gotten quite a few books on DW and Photoshop and found myself performing many tasks easily after a short while. Unfortunately, I didn’t get that out of Flash MX Hands On Training. THat’s not to say that the book is worthless. The exercises included with the accompanying CD are good. However, I think the author focuses too much on you completing the exercises rather than explaining to you what you are doing and for what reason. THe author will take you step by step through the exercises but does not provide the proper background to actually do it without the exercises. I found myself repeating the exercises a number of times and still not getting down the basic task. That is, I couldn’t do a number of the things even after having gone through the exercises because I feel the author spends too much time telling you what you have to do to complete the exercise. After going through the book and doing almost every exercise, I actually got discouraged and decided not to continue with Flash. However, I decided I would go with one of the other books out there and see what they have to offer.
Based on my experience I would have to not recommend the book.

Well written, organized, logical progression of concepts
The author has demonstrated great skill in presenting the general concepts for using Flash MX 2004. This book is excellent for the person who needs to know both how and why to do things in Flash. When you finish the book, you should have no trouble understanding how to use Flash at an intermediate level.

In regard to the writing style, very rarely did I encounter explanations that made assumptions about the reader’s understanding of the hands-on process. The author knows how to use English well enough so that technical concepts are understood. Usually, many authors of most technical manuals are generally incapable of explaining a topic without utterly confusing the reader, which seems to come mostly from making assumptions. You will not encounter that in this book.