When I first started with Flash (circa 1999, Flash 4 days) people had the perception that Flash was a lot of fun, but really complicated compared to other web technologies.

Seven years later, that perception has become a fact. Flash is great fun. I love developing in Flash and have ever since I decided to become a Flash developer. But one of the most common questions I get from people new to it is, "Where do you start?"

When you want to be a Flash developer, where do you start these days? (Not a rhetorical question. Please post in the comments) It's not at all clear.

So much has been added to Flash. Video, Remoting/AMF, Media Server, Red5, Flex, Laszlo, etc. are some huge additions to Flash development since the time that I first started with it. I never really know where to tell people where to get started. So, I tell people to start where I started.

When I first started, the very first book I read on the subject was an introductory book from friends of Ed. They've really carved out a space for themselves by providing Flash development books for designers. If you're a designer looking to get into some Flash development, Friends of Ed has always been the way to go.

I just finished reading their most recent book "Foundation Flash CS3 for Designers". The "for Designers" part is a bit of a red herring. I consider everyone developing anything in Flash, a developer. But there are definitely two tracks when coming to Flash. As a design tool, you may want to learn to code. As a coder you may need to gain a handle on design. Either way, this is the book to give you an overview of the tool you have chosen.

This book should be required reading for anyone considering getting into Flash development. You need to know what the tool is capable of before you can design for it, or before you can code for it. But as a designer looking for a clue into the wonderful tool that Flash is (and has always been), this is your jump-off point.

You can't squeeze everything about Flash in 500+ pages, but Tom Green and David Stiller have done a great job packing as much as possible into the pages they have available to them.

They start out covering the IDE (the Flash development environment itself), but they quickly jump into some intermediate concepts like dealing with symbols in the library and 9-slice scaling. They give a great overview of ActionScript and media management (Audio, Video, tweening Flash animations, etc.).

The book ends with an overview of how to work with data (XML) in Flash and even gets into developing Flash for mobile devices. As it gets toward the end of the book, the pace picks up and the subjects covered are really more of an overview than a deep look into them. But, the authors do a great job going into the depth that they can in the space available to provide an understanding of the subject and give you the foundation you'll need to move on to more specialized study.

If you've ever felt that everything written about Flash and ActionScript assumes some kind of prior knowledge, "Foundation Flash CS3 for Designers" is the Rosetta Stone to help guide you into the greater world of Flash development.

We have a tendency to get all interested in new things, like Flex and Apollo/AIR, but old school Flash is really where the fun is. If you're a designer, I recommend this book highly as a starting place. For that matter, I recommend it highly for veterans that maybe hadn't read a Flash book recently.

Flash has changed a lot over the years. It's bigger and more powerful. The imposing learning curve can be very intimidating, but (as always) Friends of Ed has given us a great book to cut through the clutter and provide a foundation for any Flash developer.

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