* Includes perspectives from both traditional broadcast animators and seasoned Flash animators. * Provides information on pitfalls to avoid and where to find additional resources on Flash, animation, and television production. * Packed with tips, techniques, and case studies from shops on the cutting edge of Flash development. * Companion Website includes dynamic examples from the book and links to the hottest broadcast Flash animation created by third parties.
If you are a professional animator and want to learn to use the Flash environment as a vehicle for your creative work then this is the book for you. It gets you up to speed fast with the basics of how to use Flash MX to animate, so you can start concentrating on how best to translate your animation skills to this medium. The techniques shown throughout the book build up in skill level quickly, showing you clearly and concisely the most effective way to translate your animations into Flash with the focus remaining on the importance of creative animation techniques. Benefit from Sprite Interactive's wealth of tips and tricks from their wide range of professional Flash animation work and successful training courses. Learn how to apply these techniques to your own work, how to make your characters run in Flash, speed them up and slow them down, make them stumble as they walk, show their anger or fear, make them come to life. Alex Michael, Lead Animator and MD of Sprite Interactive (www.sprite.net), shows you how to achieve all the creative skills of traditional animation using Flash so you can create work for a wide variety of new and innovative platforms, including PocketPCs and interactive TV, as well as video and the web. The free CD includes all the files you need to try everything in the book for yourself, as well as invaluable time and money saving animation processes and tools. Make sure you are at the cutting edge of animation and push your creative skills to the edge, if you want to animate successfully in Flash, buy this book.
* The only book completely devoted to this exciting new technology that enables Flash to utilize resources on the server side * Flash Remoting MX allows developers to turn Macromedia Flash movies into serious Web applications like message boards, e-commerce applications, and e-mail clients * Packed with hands-on instructions and fully-functioning Flash Remoting MX applications to help readers build their own applications quickly and easily * Written by an expert Flash developer whose clients include Warner Brothers, Sony, and Disney
If you're serious about Flash design, and if you want to push your ideas to the very limits of possibility in Flash MX, then this book and CD are your indispensable companions. This package combines two vital elements: the most comprehensive and in-depth reference resource for Flash MX ActionScript Rich, and practical tutorials on using ActionScript effectively in your Flash movie design. We've packed in 20 chapters of tutorials, hundreds of detailed reference entries, and hundreds of example FLAs and SWFs. The CD reproduces and expands the complete ActionScript dictionary, providing you with a comprehensive and portable reference tool. To gain an idea of the CD's content, view our online demonstration. You can view all the dictionary's entries, but only the first 30 or so are functional. Our aim has been to make this book the best Flash MX ActionScript resource, bar none—the book that you'll keep on your desk and never exhaust.
How motion design is taught in more than 45 leading programs. * Detailed syllabi and descriptions of class projects and assignments * Go-to guide for professors and teachers planning their courses * Course plans from School of Visual Arts, Ohio State, Rochester Institute of Technology, many other top schools. This definitive study of motion design is essential reading for everyone teaching or studying design. Now, for the first time, authors Steven Heller and Michael Dooley present a comprehensive look at course offerings from more than 45 leading programs devoted to design, illustration, animation, and computer art. Taken together, they provide a close-up look at the principles and practices of 3D computer animation, character animation, pictorial background illustration, motion graphic design, interactive media, film design, and more, with class projects and syllabi from many of the most prestigious schools in the country. Organized in easy-to-use sections by year of study, this invaluable tool will be every graphic design educator’s go-to guide. Allworth Press, an imprint of Skyhorse Publishing, publishes a broad range of books on the visual and performing arts, with emphasis on the business of art. Our titles cover subjects such as graphic design, theater, branding, fine art, photography, interior design, writing, acting, film, how to start careers, business and legal forms, business practices, and more. While we don't aspire to publish a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are deeply committed to quality books that help creative professionals succeed and thrive. We often publish in areas overlooked by other publishers and welcome the author whose expertise can help our audience of readers.
Contents of accompanying CD-ROM: Examples and Trial versions of Flash MX 2004, Canvas 9 Professional Ed., Sorenson Squeeze, Swift 3D, Toon Boom Studio.
by Bruce Herbert and Diana Johnson ofSorenson Media Creative boundaries are being blown apart as Macromedia Flash MX ushers in a new era of moving images on the Internet. At its launch, analysts predicted that the Flash Player would transform itself from being a lightweight animation tool" to "the de facto technology for simple web interactivity5* (Randy Souza, Forrester). Since then though, Flash developers combining vector animation and video have proven that it's capable of much, much more than "simple web interactivity". We're still just beginning to scratch the surface of the possibilities it opens up to us, but already it looks like Flash MX is becoming the key technology for pushing video creativity on the Web to a new whole level. Understandably, many people look at Flash as just another way to deliver video on the Web, one more program for showing movies on your desktop. Well, it can certainly do that - but there's a whole lot more it can do besides! You can use ActionScript to add custom controls, determine a video playback sequence, or mask your video with a custom shape. You can use layering to create special effects, design custom templates for e-learning applications, and use lightweight video streams along with Flash animation in rich media e-mail campaigns.
This is a comprehensive introduction to Macromedia Flash, combined with special beginning-level coverage of ActionScript, Flash's native programming language.
Macromedia's Flash 8 is the world's premier program for adding animation to websites. And with the latest version, this popular program becomes more versatile, letting beginning webmasters and expert developers alike create sophisticated web content. But Flash isn't intuitive. And it doesn't come with a manual. Whether you want to learn the basics or unleash the program's true power, Flash 8: The Missing Manual is the ideal instructor. This hands-on guide to today's hottest web design tool is aimed at nondevelopers, and it teaches you how to translate your ideas into great web content. It begins with a solid primer on animation, which helps you get comfortable with the Flash interface. Once you have these basics under your belt, Flash 8: The Missing Manual moves on to advanced animations, including adding special effects and audio, video, and interactivity to your presentations. When you're really feeling steady, the book shows how to use a dollop of ActionScript to customize your content. It then teaches you how to publish your Flash creations for web surfers everywhere to enjoy. Along the way, the book shows you good design principles and helps you avoid elements that can distract or annoy an audience. Author Emily Vander Veer has more than a dozen books to her credit, including titles on web design and scripting--most written for non-technical readers. Her background makes her the perfect author for a straightforward book on a complex subject. She takes Flash 8: The Missing Manual from the basics to the advanced, yet avoids a hasty jump into tough topics that can leave readers confused. Not only will Flash 8: The Missing Manual help you turn a concept into unique, dynamic content, but it will continue to serve as a reference as you develop your website.
