Am I suited to Flash programming?

[jimr451]

Hi all,

I'm a traditional LAMP programmer. When it comes to anything related to graphics / design, I have no skills at all. I can do html / css ok, but have no
artistic skills at all.

My question is - is Flash a good "tool" to add to my toolbox, or will I need a fair amount of graphics understanding to get anything out of it? Most flash stuff I see is heavy on animation, graphics, etc.

Any thoughts or comments from other LAMPers who also do Flash?

-Jim

[criterion9]

Learn AS3. It is very similar in construct to other OOP languages. You can programatically construct the animations and such (though you'll need more solid math than regular data fetching requires).

[jimr451]

Thanks - that sounds like a good place to start.

-Jim

[criterion9]

The nice part about using AS3 is you can transfer those skills (and even sometimes the class files themselves) to Adobe AIR and Flex equally well as Flash.

[tedscoffee]

Flash is both a design software, and a programming language. If your background is a programmer, you might be able to catch up the Actionscript programming part quickly, however design is a skill which can't be learn alike programming. Maybe you can consider some flash builder software (http://www.faico.net/) which can help you to create flash gallery, animation, flash websites quickly, and then offer them to clients as part of your service. These software offer ready-made flash components which you can easily embed into your HTML/CSS based web pages.