Flash courses in Sydney...

[]v[orpheus]

Has anyone done any Flash courses in Sydney? WHere they any good and how much?

[TheOriginalFlashDavo]

Teach yourself, teach yourself, teach yourself....

I've been sent to a few courses over the years by various employers, and every time I've got more either from the web or from a high quality book.

The Adobe "classroom in a book" are an obvious example. That same content that costs around AUS$100 for the book, is taught in classrooms for near AUS$1,000!! Quite a mark up simply to have a guy in the room with you!

I'm sure there are similar Flash books.

And a certificate is not going to get you a job, the work you can show someone is (although in the current climate even that's tough!!).

You're actually better off doing what I'm doing - all your software and software language teachings do by yourself in your own time, and study something with a longer term goal in mind where a degree or qualification may help. In my case it's a Communications degree, which covers areas of management, advertising, media...etc.

Cheers
Dave

[michele de gidro]

Educom runs them all the time.
They are great !!

About $700 - $800 for 2 day courses - intro and advanced. summer specials are about to start....

As for teaching yourself - this is possible if you are already a programmer with lots of image editing experience.

For sure - teach yourself Fireworks, but flash?????

[]v[orpheus]

Thanks for the feedback!

That's a bit much but I guess it's standard.

I've decided that I'll finally get off my lazy arse and go off to the bookstore and buy some Flash books to teach myself.

However, I'll be on the lookout for free Flash courses. Sometimes community colleges offer free courses.

[TheOriginalFlashDavo]

Originally posted by michele de gidro

As for teaching yourself - this is possible if you are already a programmer with lots of image editing experience.

For sure - teach yourself Fireworks, but flash?????

I taught myself - with no programming experience at all. It's just like anything else, you start with the basics and build. I actually found it easier to pick up than my few attempts at Fireworks (and now with ImageReady who needs that?!).

There are so many resources and tutorials out there you really, really don't need to do a course. The only reason to do so is if that little piece of paper is going to make a difference.

Beleive me, I've interviewed applicants who have graduated from supposed decent courses - including the Computer Graphics College, and TAFE - and they have usually had less ability than someone self taught.

Cheers
Dave

[TianaKaeSha]

I agree teaching yourself has some merit... however personally I am not the type of person who can actually learn well from a book or a manual. I am the type of person who's brain prefers to see and react and interact.

I have recieve great benefit from various courses that teach me basics and then knowing that can dabble and learn more with myself.

The tutorials on FK provide a happy medium.. they show you the things and teach you like a manual and that is great...

I just wanted to point out that not everyone can learn from a book. I have great difficulty in this myself.

But if you can learn from a book it certainly is cheaper!!

[eggler]

The Queensland Teacher's Credit Union (??) presented a free Macromedia seminar on the Macromedia products which went around Queensland, but I'm not sure about the rest of Australia. Very brief, I won a free cap :-) (Another guy won the complete macromedia suite!)

Peace

[TheOriginalFlashDavo]

I do know what you mean about some courses. For example my degree I'm doing part time I need the interaction with other students as much as anything else (which has nothing to do with computer software though). I just find that there's so much free stuff out there on the net to learn, and that most courses I've attended the person teaching has not been as knowledgable as I would expect (I mean, if they were why are they teaching?!?!) I've just been very disapointed.

I did a Director course a year or so ago, and the teacher knew only the very basics. She couldn't answer some of the simple questions I had. I found the answer from the help menu eventually, and I've now taught myself more over a week to do a CD-Rom for a client than I learnt from 8 evenings of classes, so I'm just looking from personal experience, and at what sells as a potential employee.

Cheers
Dave

[]v[orpheus]

OK, so can anyone recommend a good Flash book which I can learn from?

I know absolute bugger all about it!