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Book review: Teach Yourself Flash CS3 Professional in 24 Hours

This is the latest incarnation of the 'Teach Yourself Flash in 24 Hours' series of books. The author again is Philip Kerman who has helmed the series since it's first outing, teaching Flash 5 back in 2000.

TITLE: Teach Yourself Flash CS3 Professional in 24 Hours
AUTHOR: Philip Kerman
PUBLISHER: Sams
ISBN: 978-0-672-32937-1
PAGES: 547 b&w
CD: No
PRICE: Â£24.99 UK / $34.99 USA / $43.99 CAN
Click here to order

I'm sure you've familiar with the format by now but incase you've been living under a rock since Flash 5 the idea is pretty simple: Over the course of 24 one hour sessions you get to grips with Flash CS3 Professional. When I say 'get to grips' I mean you'll learn how to create and publish Flash animations, work with components, digital video and get started with Actionscript.

You won't learn anything about AS2 or AS3, but that's as it should be in a book aimed at beginners. It's already the size of a phone book without getting into any of that! There's enough simple Actionscript though to whet the appetite of any would-be programmers and not too much as to alarm the designers and animators.

The 24 lessons are grouped into four broad sections:

Part 1. "Assembling the graphics you'll animate in Flash"
Part 2. "Animating in Flash"
Part 3. "Adding Interactivity and video"
Part 4. "Putting it all together for the web"

At the end of each lesson is a summary followed by a Q&A and a Quiz. The quizzes are quite fun to do even if you've been working with Flash for a while, and Philip's answers are often extensive and illuminating. For example, in answer to the question, "How do you open and edit a swf file?" he goes beyond the simple 'import it' reply and goes onto discuss the various Flash decompilers. Pretty hardcore for hour number 1.

The 'hour long' lesson concept works well for the most part, although I'm sure as the lessons go on some hours will seem longer than others. The section on components and data providers for example is likely to separate the left brainers from the right brainers. The key thing about the structure though is that each lesson builds on the last and by the time you get to the more complex concepts you should be well prepared for them.

TYFCS3P in 24 Hours is solidly written and should prove a good introduction for any newbie to the world of Flash. If Jack Bauer only had 24 hours to learn Flash he'd get this book. Dammit!