Foundation Actionscript 3.0 Animation: Making Things Move!

If you're new to AS 3 and have some kind of OOP (Object Oriented Programming) experience in your past or none at all then this book is right up your alley...an experienced programmer may find this book a little simplistic. Anyway, I've always had a problem understanding programming concepts because I could never apply them to real world applications. All through college while taking JAVA, VB, PL/SQL...etc I always felt like I never truly grasped some of the basic concepts that made up OOP. The way Keith Peters explains his examples and some of the more basic concepts that make up AS 3 is awesome. I've been able to couple his explanations with the stuff I've learned in the past to really help clarify some of these more basic OOP concepts that I could never quite grasp. Since AS 3 is a lot like JAVA, I have a really good jumping off point for doing some really cool things with this language. This book has really lit a new fire of excitement in me for OOP that was long lost back in school. I really enjoy this book and the way the author uses real world terms and normal "speaking language" to write the book. It's as if he's speaking to you in person and explaining things to you face to face.I have one CON to all of the PROS. The book needs a resource CD with the code chapter by chapter. I know, I'm lazy. But sometimes it really helps to compare my code that I may have problems finding the errors in with the correct code just to see if it's my code with the problem, the class path I have setup, an author error or maybe even something else. Regardless the book is well worth the money I spent and I'd recommend it to anyone.

Keith Peters has written another excellent teach-yourself book pertaining to Actionscript. I also have a copy of his Foundation Actionscript 2.0 book. I am only half way through the book as of now due to my reading several other books concurrently with this one, but it has already taught me a lot. Keith Peters teaching style is easy reading, with humor and taught by examples which are easy to follow and comprehend. I highly recommend this book to anyone first learning Actionscript and to those of us familiar with Actionscript 2.0 transitioning to Actionscript 3.0. There are significant changes in Actionscript from versions 2.0 to 3.0 and Keith Peters clearly lays them out.The only negative I give the book, and it is a small and correctible problem, is there exists conflicts in the book's examples prevently the examples from running correctly. Specifically, I refer to the names given to the mouse handlers in the examples' functions; e.g. the function name "onMouseDown" conflicts with the Actionscript naming conventions preventing examples using that function name to run or to run without error. This I easily corrected by renaming the function "onMouseDown1." I did the same with "onMouseUp" changing it to "onMouseUp1" and this corrected all such errors.

If you, like me, are designer centric then this may very well be the answer for you when it comes to understanding actionscript. AS2 was a very forgiving but highly mysterious language to me but I was able to make it work even though the how and why remained a blank area. When AS3 arrived I was totally lost in a programmers world were actionscript had suddenly become a foriegn language study.Buying Foundation Actionscript 3.0 has changed that, although it isn't a book for first time flash users as it assumes that the reader knows Flash fundementals, it clearly leads a non-programmer, like myself, into how to work with AS3 AND understand the why of it working so that one becomes able to work with AS3 and build your own applications with the knowledge of how and why they work.Excellently written and so so easy to follow!!!

This is a great book well written, I have a slow learning curve so I have not used a lot of the principles in the book, but they are sound. If you are looking for a book to tell you how to use Actionscript 3.0 code to help you move your animations around without doing manual key framing this is the De Facto book. I bought It for reference, because I have this title already as an E book, but I needed one that I could watch without looking at the computer to read for reference, I didn't want to use two monitors one for the book and the other for Flash. I would recommend this book to anyone, and say it's a must by for people interested in Actionscripting.

I've been working with Flash since 5.0 and have always tried to keep up with the changes. The release of ActionScript 3.0 pretty much means that one has to learn a whole new way of creating graphics and effects in code. This book makes that transition a whole lot easier. It's not for beginners by any means as it deals in very advanced concepts, but if you are a game or effects developer and you want to get up to speed with the new capabilities of Flash 9, "this is a great book", as the author has aptly stated. The forward from Aral Balkan pretty much sums up the state of the art which we have come to know as Flash. "Programming is a new, exciting art form...", and this book definitely will introduce you to the new paradigm.

This book does what the title states, the author teaches you to make objects with code and then move them. Which is well and good if your recreating Asteroids, or want a triangle for a spaceship.However if you want to also know how to use symbols you have already created in flash, you will need to find someone else to help you. This book doesn't cover the integration of images or how to make non-code created images move.It is a great book to start you learning how to structure code and how to draw with code, especially if you are new to flash and want to take a programmer / developer approach to learning action script 3.

I knew virutally no actionscript when I got this book, but I have programmed in a variety of languages in the past most relevantly probably C, C++ and a little Java. That said I am in no way a professional programmer, but have done a bit over the year peripherally inscientific computing, or hobby stuff. Anyway for me this was an excellent introduction to actionscript and what you could do with it. YEs there is plenty of stuff in here not covered - as it really just gets you going straight into the fun stuff. If you want to have a more rounded view of the functionality of AS3 then get some of the more general reference, but if you 1) know a bit of object oriented programming, this is a great fun introduction into AS3 - certainly this book and the sequel are my two favourite AS3 books, even though they in no way are complete references. They explain the main detals and the fun stuff to make things move, nd make things happen. Keith Peters writes great educational stuff.

I'm fairly new to Flash and wanted to dip my toe in Actionscript 3.0 to see what cool stuff I could learn. I was actually very apprehensive about doing this as my background is more graphics & web design rather "programming / scripting". However this book is fabulous. It has just about every cool thing you would want to do in flash, and completely liberates you from the rather limiting and dull timeline based animations. The book is extremely readable and very clearly explained. Keith Peters really does hold your hand all the way through it, and gradually builds up examples from basics into really jaw dropping effects, (and there are so many effects effects covered in this book). I thoroughly recommend this book for beginner & intermediate Actionscripters, you will be amazed at what you can achieve. Don't be scared, its great!

As a student currently at university looking for a gentle introduction to Actionscript 3.0 - with exposure to animation and physics - this is an excellent book in both theory and creative potential. Although my knowledge of maths isn't to an advanced standard, the author introduces trigonometry and topics in physics at a good pace and in adequate detail to ensure that you obtain a good balance between theory and practice!The only snag with this book as I have discovered, is that some of the code is missing from many of the examples later on in the book which can be overcome by downloading the examples in complete form from the friendsofed website.Although I have yet to finish reading this book, this is an excellent read for anybody with a desire to create animated objects/projects using AS 3.0, or for those who wish to obtain a solid foundation onto more advanced areas such as computer graphics programming, game development or build upon their existing Actionscript/Flash knowledge!

I needed quite a lot of help with ActionScript 3 as I'm not much of a programmer, but I love animation, and have to keep up with technology as it gets developed. I found this book to be an enormous help. I highly recommend it to those who are at "entry level" regarding ActionScript 3.

Good Book.