Product Description

Sure you can animate using motion tweens, in fact we'll help you do that with our Flash Cartoon Animation book, but isn't there something extra special in making things move with just a few lines of code? In this book Keith Peters guides us through some basic animation theory and then demystifies the math and physics behind creating realistic animation, looking at trigonometry, velocity and acceleration, and bouncing & friction. This book will teach you how to use Flash ActionScript to move the objects in your movies, rather than letting Flash's tween engine do it for you. The benefit of this is smaller, more realistic, more dynamic interactive movies that seem to come alive on your screen. Almost all of the code featured in this book will work fine in either Flash MX 2004 or Flash 8, and with a few minor adjustments, most of it can even be applied to Flash MX. Although the text covers many advanced math and physics concepts, making for very realistic motion, there's no need to worry, even if you're a relative newcomer to programming and the last math class you took was in high school (and even if you barely remember that!). This book first covers everything you need to know to get started: the principles of animation, and the basics of ActionScript, trigonometry, and Flash rendering methods. You'll work your way slowly from using code to move a single object across the screen to creating complex systems that really push Flash's capabilities with topics covered including collision detection, particle attraction, and kinematics. The book concludes with looking at 3D animation techniques, including building a basic 3D engine, 3D lines, fills and solids, and matrix math. Once you come to grips with the ideas presented here, you'll find yourself creating all manner of exciting animations and games! Summary of Contents     Part I ActionScripted Animation Basics     Ch. 1 Basic Animation Concepts     Ch. 2 ActionScript Basics for Animation     Ch. 3 Trigonometry     Ch. 4 Rendering Techniques     Part II Basic Motion     Ch. 5 Velocity and Acceleration     Ch. 6 Bouncing and Friction     Ch. 7 User Interaction: Dragging and Throwing     Part III Advanced Motion     Ch. 8 Easing and Springs     Ch. 9 Collision Detection     Ch. 10 Bouncing off Angles     Ch. 11 Billiard Ball Physics     Ch. 12 Particle Attraction     Ch. 13 Forward Kinematics     Ch. 14 Inverse Kinematics     Part IV Three D     Ch. 15 A Basic 3D Engine     Ch. 16 3D Lines, Fills, Solids     Ch. 17 Advanced 3D: Backface Culling and Lighting     Ch. 18 Matrix Math     Part V Tips and Tricks     Ch. 19 Tips and Tricks

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #266542 in Books
• Published on: 2005-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Customer Reviews

Better late than never!
This is the book! This is the most complete book about acionscript I've never bought. Don't get me wrong, colin mook is amazing with his books, but they will always stay a reference book for pure actionscript syntax and concept behind what and why use certain language. But this book is the book that tell you how make ALL those cool animation that you really need and that we all see on the web. It tells you why certain things moves like this and the author is a superb teacher. Really, don't get this review as a WOW review, get it as a fact. Like things bouncing uh? and how about moving things super smooth? peeps this book is what we were waiting for so long. It's here finally. Better late than never! (a pure, simple, nice actionscript lesson about creating what we really would like to do).

Great Book
This is a great book if your trying to learn actionscript rather than using Flash tweening. It helps with the basics and will be of interest to a wide range of people from those who want to learn basic animation to those wanting to write there own flash games. The book will gives you a good set of techniques that you will be able to use in your own Flash projects. Maybe not for the total flash beginner as some of the chapters cover trigonometry, rendering, collision dectection, kinematics, and 3D flash. Written for Flash MX2004 and Flash 8. A nice buy for those wanting to extend their flash animation knowledge.

Excellent
I really love this book. In the first 40 pages I've learned more actionscript than from two other books. Keith Peters concentrates on the important things, leaving away the useless clutter.
It is an interesting read, also if you don't specially want to program animations. By the way, don't miss the foreword from Aral Balkan.