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Flash Web Animations

The internet is now more about graphics, games, cartoons and interactivity than plain text and images. Play your part by taking a course in Flash development...

Internet sites continue to develop quickly, with additional features, content and gadgets being added all the time. The arrival of broadband means that many more internet users are able to access these sites, and most even simple web pages now feature a good few bells and whistles. A high proportion of these elements - whether swishing graphics, colourful animations or interactive games - will be designed using the Adobe Flash application.

Flash is an incredibly powerful tool which is also pretty simple to learn at the most basic level. Professional programmers can use it to design entire e-learning programmes or very advanced websites, while even beginners with a few hours experience can use Flash to add simple but attractive button links to their personal homepage or animate surprisingly intricate cartoons to amaze their friends. Other content that can be developed using Flash include user interfaces, feature length films, online advertisements, audio content, corporate videos, enterprise application dashboards and lots lots more.

Flash files (or "movies") are played in a Flash Player - a separate piece of software which is free to download from the Adobe website. This player runs within (or sometimes alongside) your primary internet browser and is compatible with most including Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari. Adobe say that over 97% of desktop internet users can watch Flash movies.

The Flash programme has been around for over a decade in a number of different guises. A 'vector based web animation' tool was originally designed back in 1993, and was soon snapped up by software company Macromedia - who released the first Flash product in 1996. Macromedia continued to develop the application and add lots of new features and utilities, with new releases culminating in Flash MX 2004. In 2005 Adobe bought out Macromedia, and took over the development and marketing of the Flash brand.

Flash uses vector based graphics, which means that geometrical concepts such as points, lines, curves and polygons are used to represent images on the screen. Complex arrangements of these concepts are used by Flash to make the movies. The Flash tool itself does all the maths, you just choose a command (for example if you choose the 'motion tween' action you can then watch a square turn into a circle, or a fish into a bicycle, right before your eyes).

A beginners' Flash course should give students a solid understanding of the Flash programme and its various applications. An advantage of Flash is that the basics are simple enough for anyone who has a general knowledge of IT applications, you don't need to have programming or advanced web design skills in advance. The intuitive drawing tools are not unlike a simple desktop publishing programme and after a few weeks on a beginners' course you will be able to create and edit objects, make simple animations, work with text, create hyperlinks, use keyframes and layers, add audio and generally do everything needed to create your own interactive movies.

More advanced courses aimed at IT professionals are also available. These might include tuition in Actionscript, which is a scripting or programming language that allows the programmer greater control over their movies and can be used to make Flash to carry out more advanced tasks. You will also learn how to use Flash in conjunction with other applications such as web-design and image manipulation tools. Distance learning courses are also available, with online and DVD delivered programme options for Irish students.

While most colleges will be equipped with PCs or Macs set up with the programme in-house, if you go to the trouble of taking a course you might want to purchase the Flash software yourself. Flash MX 2004 costs around €349.00 ex VAT for the basic application and €699.00 for the Professional version. Flash is also available bundled with other products including Dreamweaver and Fireworks in the Macromedia Studio.

The skills you learn on a Flash course might prove useful in a number of ways. A Flash qualification will impress potential employers if you are looking for a web-design, games-design, multimedia or similar job. Flash courses are not necessarily about your career though, for those with an interest in the web, and some innate creativity, they can be particularly rewarding. You can use Flash to design your own really impressive homepage, while Flash movies and animations are really taking off as an art form in themselves - the BBC and Comedy Central are among broadcasters who show cartoons designed using Flash on regular TV.

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Flash Web Animations

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