I feel like such a newbie...

[lava]

Damn... I was feeling pretty good about my flash skills, but then I see other people's projects and I feel like such a newbie... I've only been doing Flash since December... geez. For those of you who are awesome at flash... how long have you guys been doing it?
Raf

[Guig0]

you can´t compare yourself with some ppl here like sen, ilyas, lost, h88, etc.. in flash skills, coz these ppl are not human, and don´t have a life at all.

i´m not that advanced, coz i AM human but i don´t have a life too :P , so, i´m only the half of these guys ;)

:P :P



seriously, those that have uncany flash skills are great programers in other languages like C++ and such, therefore, they have a way with that obscure and complicated part of flash that i like to call AS, that we, normal ppl, don´t have.

[Kitiara]

Don't be too hard on yourselves. :)

To get good - really good - takes time, you just have to practice. It's like anything else. I found the best way to learn is to go through tutorials, try things out and then think of your own ways to expand them. Don't try and run before you can walk, kind of thing. From the look of it you've got the basics down, so it's just a matter of keep doing things with the skills.

Oh, and welcome to the forums. :)

[lava]

eh... I could do something like megacar... you can tell it doesnt involve that much actionscript... it's all animations, and those are easy to do. but I was thinking more of this site...
http://www.superhere.net/flash.html

Like the calendar that the dude has there... it's awesome. My site doesnt have timeline animations... it's all math, but the reason why I feel like such a newbie is that I'm still getting accustomed to flash. For a while I didnt really look at tutorials or anything, I was just exploring stuff on my own (like with my site) but then I started looking at tutorials and a book I bought, and I'm just doing stupid stuff (like writing code inside a movie instead of writing it to an object...)

And there's still some stuff I can't do. I'm writing a little pong game (cause I want to get started in writing games for flash) and I have everything set except that I dont know how to stop the action if someone scores.... AAAAAARRGHH I'm frustrated... I want to get better already.

I guess I'm just annoyed that I dont really have that much TIME to work on flash.

AAAAAARGH... I just feel like smacking someone... hehe

[eyeinfinitude]

Lavaboy, this may sound pretty negative, but there will always be someone better than you and it's important to have someone better than you so you can gain inspiration and push forward.

I come to this forum mainly to learn flash and help others, but I also come to gain inspiration.

It's perfectly normal to feel inferior to some of the people here because I feel the same as well, but don't let it stop you from pushing forward.

You may not know this, but there are probably others out there that feels inferior looking at your work too. So keep that in mind and good luck. =)

[lava]

sweet!
As long as there are people feeling inferior to me, I'm set!
:)

[Aislin]

Well, I'd like to think I'm better than some people. A lot of people, actually. I think I'm better than most people on the planet at flash. (When I say this, I mean the ones that don't know flash. My cruddy skills are at least better than theirs!)

[Makaveli]

the first step to failure is trying - homer

:A+: homer puts everything in perspective!

[reverendflash]

Just as Stevie Ray Vaughn didn't learn to play guitar in a few months, the same can be said for Flash.

I spent 6-8 hours a day for 6 solid weeks before I even built a flash site for money. I still spend 4-5 hours a week trying to learn new stuff about the program (it is an extremely robust program), offline from Kirupalvania::I still think Kirupalvania is a much better name:: ...

So don't dispair, practice, practice, practice...

Revhttp://www.aulman.com/rev.gif

[lava]

if it's kirupalvaina, what would that make Kirupa? Count Kirupala?

[reverendflash]

LOL

that has a kinda Yittish sound to it... Kirupala... ha ha!

It would make us all Kirupals (kinda like the Mongols)...

Long Live Kirupalvania!

Revhttp://www.aulman.com/rev.gif

[upuaut]

I'm a newb and I've been Flashing since 4.0. :)

[lostinbeta]

I don't consider myself a newbie, but in terms of Flash, there are two sides.... Design, and Coding. I for one am stronger in the coding side and am a complete n00b in the design department of it. I fail horribly there.

Flash takes a really long time to learn, you can't expect to do a superhere site in a matter of a few months... that site probably took a few months just to make!

I have been learning Flash for 8 months now and I STILL learn something new every day. So it takes a really long time.

It also helps to know other languages, like I knew Javascript before learning Actionscript, and since they are similar in many ways, it helped my learning process go quicker.

Playamarz is a great coder as well and he also knows a ton of other languages like C++, PHP, Javascript, mySQL, ASP, etc that probably helped him learn actionscript better.

Ilyas and Sen are just pure bred I think.... not sure :P

Don't be down on yourself, just give it time.

[CyanBlue]

Don't take it so hard, bro...

I'm still learning new things everyday, and I've been using Flash ever since F4...

Keep practicing as much as you can... That's the only way you can advance yourself... Time and effort will show you off soon... =)

lostinbeta... 8 months??? Dang... I knew that you Kirupans are not human, but that's toooooooo good to be true... 8 months??? Shut up!!! :evil:

Those people who live in Kirupaville and have been aged well are not human... They all posses special abilities that they have practiced so hard that they lose their own social life and keep themselves inside of the Kirupaville... So, young man... Go outside and get some fresh aire... and come back and study!!! :cyborg:

[lostinbeta]

Cyan: Yeah, I have been using Flash for only 8 months. My abilities aren't really that great when it comes to overall coding, but I am good with bits and pieces. There are still people here like Playamarz, Ilyas, h88, Sen, Sbeener, bit-101, etc that can wipe the floor with me. But I know where I want to go, so I am slowly learning and trying to work my way there.

I get plenty of fresh air, but where I live, I would rather not be outside, I am safer inside (maybe).

[Marz]

The outside is full of demonic huminoids that wnt to eat me alive...

Anyways.. Now that I've got that off my chest.

Thanks beta... But yeha.. I won't say how long I spent in AS>. Most of you would hate me and throw books at me... But I've known the Flahs interface since Flash 3. But.. I never started coding until Flash 5 really late... And too late..C ause I got Flash MX a week later...

I built a physics ball demo...



That was after my first week of AS study... Sorry guys.. i didn't wanna tell you.. But to make it feel less.. I stuied JavaScript and C++ beforehand.. And anyone who has seen those langauges nows the syntax is close...

But I'm not that good.. I'll deny my abilities to the end of a shot rod.. Just like EG keeps pounding my head about.. IT WON'T WORK! *lmao*... :)

[RelandR]

Originally posted by lavaboy
sweet!
As long as there are people feeling inferior to me, I'm set!
:)
Boy, I'm sure glad there was a :) following that bit... :!: ... ;)

Honestly ... you have no idea (perhaps now somewhat of one) just how 'advanced in flash' you really are. I certainly didn't know that you'd just picked Flash up recently.
I stumbled on your webGallery sample/code this afternoon, and I was going to hound you for code-comments and the .fla if I didn't see it soon.
I also saw from your accolades in your site that you're quite the Math/scientific type and am certain you'll rocket right up there once you're comfortable with all the bits in the prog.

Me (?) - I'm just too phreakin old to feel inferior to anyone... just a waste of time and anxiety... but I've been fumbling around with this for about a year and a half - and it still just looks like fancy HTML :phil: - but yer never too old fer jealousy - :smirk:

...And to the rest of you *Quick~Studies'* :geek: :beam: :geek:

Don't sweat the small stuff
inEdit:the small things in life (ie: not being all that yet) :sure:

[lostinbeta]

Originally posted by RelandR


...And to the rest of you *Quick~Studies'* :geek: :beam: :geek:

Don't sweat the small stuff

But sometimes the small stuff is the most important with AS, but since they are small they don't take long to learn so you should at least get them out of the way early ;)

[CyanBlue]

Hehe... Small stuff... That reminds me of something... You don't know how glad I am to know that Flash doesn't really care much about ';' at the end... I had bad experience with Cobol long time ago where you should have '.' at the end of each line... That was my first language which I had most of my problems grown... Small things are important things that you shouldn't be missing...

I know it's abit early(only 4:05am), but I guess I'll go try to get some sleep... Take care, guys... :sleep: :sleep:

[RelandR]

Originally posted by lostinbeta
But sometimes the small stuff is the most important with AS, but since they are small they don't take long to learn so you should at least get them out of the way early ;)

Yeah, that last line was misplaced [afterthought]... it shoulda went back up where I was talkin' to Lavaboy, in ref to his angst over not being the ****** yet ... I think I'll move it...

[lostinbeta]

Cyan: Yeah, javascript and php are not so forgiving with the semi-colon so I am used to placing them in the right place, but sometimes I am glad it doesn't effect it either. Now if only it did that for curly brackets :P

RelandR: Oh ok :)

[Marz]

I've begun to learn that if I don't put a semicolon where I need it to be.. I'll die.. *lmao*

Not really.. But yeha.. About the ball thing up there in my other post.. I was soooooo happy when I made that.. I felt spedcial.. til I looked at what other people was doing.. Then I felt stupid.. *lmao*...

But really man.. we all start off as newbies.. But we expand our knowledge by how much you wnat to give in to it... I didn't become the way I knew form sitting on my ***.. I've researched many of nights and read many of books to get where I am.. And I'm still moving on.. I suggest you'd do the same if you're serious about this... It's quite rewarding everytime you help someone or finish a project of your own...

It's bed time though.. 4:15 am... Only got 2 hrs sleep last night.. hehe..

Peace

[Kitiara]

I've begun to learn that if I don't put a semicolon where I need it to be.. I'll die.. If I had a pound for every time one of my C / C++ programs crashed and burned simply because of a missed semi colon, I'd be a rich woman.

Ah, the joys of trawling through code to find that one you forgot...

There is a point when you can know too many languages. As I discovered whilst writing a UNIX ShellScript program, spending hours wondering why it wasn't working, then realising that I'd written half of it perfectly... in DOS.

Like all things, it's practice. Although if you've done OOP before tackling ActionScript then you have a slight advantage. :)

[Marz]

Originally posted by Kitiara
If I had a pound for every time one of my C / C++ programs crashed and burned simply because of a missed semi colon, I'd be a rich woman.

Ah, the joys of trawling through code to find that one you forgot...



You aren't joking about that at all.. I remember those lovely days quite well.. Trying to program with Driect X and Windows got me so frustrated that I have yet to look at it again.. I deleted Borland's C++ and everything.. *lol*.. I'd like to get bac into it but I kind-a lost my Borland's Disc.. Whoops?



There is a point when you can know too many languages. As I discovered whilst writing a UNIX ShellScript program, spending hours wondering why it wasn't working, then realising that I'd written half of it perfectly... in DOS.


I hear that one.. I remember just about 2 days ago someone asked me for a script for Flash MX and I gave it to him perfectly...

For PHP.. *lmao*



Like all things, it's practice. Although if you've done OOP before tackling ActionScript then you have a slight advantage. :)

YaY! C++ all the way :)

[lava]

wow... somehow I got unsubscribed from this thread... I thought this thread was dead..

Reland: Thanks man, that made me feel good. Although I'm not sure what you mean by accolades. I'm going to post a tutorial on the my Flash Album sometime soon, when I'm done with the bugs on my site (yes, there are some bugs you guys haven't discovered.) If you need help, I'll be glad to answer any of your questions.


Other stuff: I guess I'm just mad that in my mind I already have the flowcharts to most of the things that I want to do, but flash presents some added complications. I think maybe I've been thinking too much in terms of movies rather than code. I bet I could do the Pong game in a jiffy in C++. It's like I'm always thinking 'I know how to do this, now just how do I do this in flash?'

I'm still in the process of figuring out how to work with Flash and actionscript. I think one of my advantages is my creativity (well, in terms of that I get an idea that no one has done, and then I try to do it, or that I try to figure out someone else's work, instead of just doing tutorials.) However, I'm just appaled at the amount of work doing something simple takes (because I have to figure out HOW to do it at first).

I eventually want to start a web design / advertising company (maybe in a couple of months), and one of my frustrations is also that I dont seem to have a sense of visual design... as you can see my website is kinda crappy in visual terms.

I mean, I know if I were given any kind of project in flash, I'd be able to do it... but I just want to minimize the TIME it takes me to do it.
Argh, I just need practice... I don't have the experience to do things quickly.

And I still feel like smacking someone... :)

[lostinbeta]

Originally posted by playamarz
Not really.. But yeha.. About the ball thing up there in my other post.. I was soooooo happy when I made that.. I felt spedcial.. til I looked at what other people was doing.. Then I felt stupid.. *lmao*...


Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. I came up with some of my early projects and I loved them.... then I found amazing sites like levitated and bit-101 and I wanted to give up and cry. But instead of doing that I told myself that I wanted to get that good, and now I practice Flash religiously :bad:

[RelandR]

If you need help, I'll be glad to answer any of your questions.

Thx...I'll be needing that - alot - RelandR:stunned:



Originally posted by lavaboy
...Reland: Thanks man, that made me feel good. Although I'm not sure what you mean by accolades. ...

Of course you wouldn't ... that's because you know what the word means and I was missusing it :sigh:

I meant *accomplishments* and it came out *rewards*... MethInks I read on your resume' or some such part of your site that your quite the *wiZzKidd* [not that You said it - but it shows]

I sense that your used to mastering things fast... and it peeves you when it doesn't happen when you think it should (?)

[down Cujo...Down] :) ;) :)

[lava]

I dont know if I get things fast, cause it's not like I've ever gotten things slow or at a normal pace (I mean.. I dont have anything to compare it to.)

Eh, and I dont think I'm a whiz kid, I just like doing certain things... and when you like something, you get good at it. When you're motivated, you do things as hard as you can. Like Kobe.. he's really motivated to get better at playing the game.

I dont think it's whether you get something fast or not, I think it's more of whether you're interested in something, and whether you have enough confidence to think you can achieve it.

[RelandR]

The *whiZzkidd* crack was my emphesis... (it was a compliment)
- I know you didn't say that -

That was to illustrate that given your achievements, it's obvious that you'll get there soon enough - and probably faster than most

=)

[lava]

thanks man... I feel the love... I feel the love...
hehe.

Hey, why dont you guys post here some of the experimental stuff you're working on... I'll do that once I'm back at home... I'll post my little stupid pong game that I can't get working... :)

[lostinbeta]

Ive been working on this....

http://www.kirupaforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=15661

[lava]

have you figured out how to resize the box dynamically?
--Raf

[lostinbeta]

No, I took a break from it. Due to computer problems I cannot over-exhert my system therefore I have not been able to write a PHP script to dynamically set Variables.

[lava]

hmm.... can you just load the jpeg into the container movieclip, and then get the width and height of the clip, and then move the movieclip into a visible area?

I'm going to try that when I get home... you got me curious.

[lostinbeta]

I want to do more with it that involves PHP. Top Secret :sleep: :P

[ArjunK]

Lost, I remembered I had bought a book on JavaScript (Sams Teach Yourself in 24 hours). I never bothered to learn it, but recently I have found myself yearning to learn more ActionScript than the little I know to make websites. Hereinlies (or however the heck you spell it :P ) the question: exactly HOW similar are JS and AS? What are the similiarities and differences? I don't mean a whole page but a little bit. Thanks for your time!

:)

[Aislin]

do you think you could really learn it in a day? a day isn't that long.
is it 24 hours, or a day. cause 24 hours could really be a half-hour lesson every day for 48 days, which is a very long time.

[lostinbeta]

You can learn basic Javascript in a day yes, but not advanced JS.


JS and AS are similar in many ways. The ways they pass variabels are the same, they use the same if/else statements, for loops, function, prototypes, etc. JS and AS actually have some of the same functions like the Math functions and such. Also the way arrays works is the same as well.

One of the main differences between AS and JS is that JS is browser related and therefore has to be coded specifically for a browser, and well... of course getting JS code to work in a browser is obviously more complex then getting it to work in a program that is made for that kind of thing. You can't just create movie clip symbols and have them do things for you. Or activate some code onEnterFrame or anything like that.

They are similar, but JS is a bit trickier to actually get to work the way you want it to (especially crossbrowser).

[Aislin]

shane makes things make sense. Sensible Shane, we should call him.

thanks for your explanamationism there. I'm not into this complicated stuff, I'll stick with the AS. ...if I EVER learn it. Heheheh.

[lava]

yeah, AS follows some language standard (you know... those usually ignored by microsoft) set by some group of internet gurus sometime ago... So if you know Javascript, you know most of flash... the other way around too.

Of course, there are limitations to AS... And one of the most annoying things about it is that your code can get all over the place..

[ArjunK]

Originally posted by Aislin
do you think you could really learn it in a day? a day isn't that long.
is it 24 hours, or a day. cause 24 hours could really be a half-hour lesson every day for 48 days, which is a very long time.

Actually I read the first 4 hours in an hour ;)


Thanks lost, that was exactly what I was looking for. Now last question. I don't want to get confused when I start ActionScript and put in JavaScript syntax and stuff. The functions may be the same, but is their exact syntax the same too? Like where the parenthesis and brackets and stuff are? I mean, would this work in the right situation in AS?:



function Hello(name) {
alert("Hello, " + name);
}

later

Hello("Arjun");


And it would display "Hello Arjun?"
I know that the function alert probably won't work, but will the brackets, etc. work? Geez this is confusing to explain via typing :P

[lostinbeta]

The alert will work, and yes, the syntax is pretty much the same.

Javascript is not so lenient with the semi-colons ";" and other various symbols that Flash is lenient about though, so be careful with that.


(and congratulations on writing your first working function in JS :*( .... they grow so fast...lol)

[Marz]

Some of the experimental stuff I'm working on?!

I don't have enough room to post everything in here.. But to make it quick and easy...

http://www.fantom-stranger.com/~mentalconcepts/experiments/

Check out all the .html files in there.. That's what I'm working on.. Check out the .fla files too if you wanna see how they are done.. The particle engine you see used there is old though.. I just created a new one last night.. That can include fading or exploding in it :)

[mariofan]

i wish my coding was as good as my art.....

my site looks quite complex but really its all in the animations...

click my footer to see..

:m:

[lava]

wow... talk about reviving an old thread...

Well, I know that originally I was kicking my butt for not being a flash god, but I just wanted to let you guys know that I'm at the point where I feel I can pretty much do anything in Flash. I don't have that much experience with it, but I've played around with it long enough to have a good feeling about it. And this is in part because of all the help I've received in kirupaforums.. thanks to Kirupa, Lost, Playa, EG, David, Kit, Renni, and all the other people who have helped me out.

I want to say something about programming skills and knowing how to program in AS. They're completely different things. I know many programmers who can't do crap in AS. But give them some other language and they'll create some pretty awesome stuff.

For all the things I've done in Flash, I've been using mostly the knowledge I learned in H.S. So when it comes to doing a gravity simulation like playa's, it's not really my knowledge of flash that helps, but my knowledge of how physics work. The most important thing when it comes to programming is not knowing the syntax of the code, but having a clear idea in your head as to how you're going to do it. With a clear idea, you've done 80% of the work.

So for those of you who are in hs still, pay attention. I payed attention in H.S., and I'm still amazed by how all the useless crap I learned is paying off right now.

[RenaissanceGirl]

Amen to that! Physics rocks.

Interesting - I thought programmers would pick up AS easily... I guess not. AS opened doors for me... it paved the way for PHP and Javascript!