The days of Flash as a creative luxury are long gone. After months of downsizing, Flash creativity has been on a huge rationalization program. It is no longer enough to present animation in millions of colors and a hundred transparencies. It is no longer sufficient to provide interactivity and dynamism for their own sake. The purpose of this collection is to show how designers have taken Flash and made it work for its supper. What we discover is a series of creations that place Flash at the hub of cutting edge web content. The end result is a snapshot of Flash as the ideal medium. In these amazing examples, we see the software pushed to its limits to create unbeatable applications-a collapsible family tree, an interactive video learning system, and a drawing tool, capable of running online! Beyond this, we dip into the back-end capabilities to look at how to improve Flash still further. Some staple XML and PHP routines are brought in to add a bit of spice, while Flash's mysterious sharedObject command is hunted down and tamed to create a hybrid Tamagotchi houseplant-perfectly suited to lure surfers back to your website!

So you think you've got to grips with the features of Macromedia Flash MX?

Welcome to this inspirations upgrade from friends of ED. Upgrade your thinking, upgrade your attitude, and upgrade your standards to take on board the host of exciting features incorporated into this version of Flash.

With this title, we run the gamut of new features, from the Drawing API ("to die for"), through new video compression, Scriptable Masks and Components. We explore the new territory with experimental interfaces, check out the improvements in the 3D arena, and quarry the back-end technologies to see what gems we can turn up

Some of the best designers in the Web community have concentrated their efforts on this project. This has resulted in the highest caliber of work, including an exclusive insight into the creation of Jim Armstrong 's New York Flash Film Festival final piece.

From the acclaimed team that brought you Flash Math Creativity comes this inspiring volume, full of brand new effects and discussion on what Flash MX is going to do for designersand where we go from here.

Creating web designs and site content in Macromedia Flash MX can be a lot of fun, but there are always tasks that you'll want to do again and again. It's always a bit of a hassle to have to keep recreating and tweaking the same old content or functionality in different projects, so why can't you just reuse what you've created? With components, you can do just that

Flash MX Components enable the creation of self-contained design building blocks that can be simply dragged and dropped into any Flash movie. They are flexible enough to be easily customized to take care of many different tasks. No fuss, no botheryou can repurpose the standard elements of your design, application, or game, and use them over and over again.

But wait, it gets better Components can be used by anyone, not just the person who created them. So in this book, we've done all the hard work for you and collected together the Most Wanted components that will make your life easier.

In this book (and on the CD), you'll find a perfect combination of creative and functional components from some of today's leading Flash designers and developers. Just look at the fantastic components yo'llu get: Event Calendar Text Editor News Feed Tool Tip Sketch Pad Video Player Image Scroller Pattern Generators Tab Control Sliding Panel Color Picker Game Player Selector Particle Emitter Layout Manager Data Grid Movie Loader Image Modulators XML-to-ActionScript Converter Virtual 3D Trackball Text Animation Dynamic Text Manager

Each of these components is included on the accompanying CD, ready to be incorporatedinto your designs, along with plenty of example files giving practical demonstrations of their use. On top of that, each chapter in this book presents a comprehensive designer-oriented guide that will help you to get the most out of using all of the featured components.

If youre a Flash designer, of any ability from novice to professional, this book will increase the power of your Flash designs and enhance your project workflowinstantly