Hello, I am John Alderman and I would like to welcome you to Total Training for Macromedia Flash Professional 8. I have been working with Flash for a long time. Actually, even before Macromedia got a hold of it.

I have been an Interactive Developer and teacher for far longer though, over 15 years. I have made my interactive presentations and movies using a lot of tools and I can tell you that Flash is one of the most powerful and complete software packages available for interactive design development and authoring.

If you are just getting started, do not worry. We are going to cover everything from the basics of animation and simple authoring, to advance topics like scripting and publishing. I have been sure to include a lot tips and tricks for you seasoned developers as well.

Now, this first lesson is a quick peek into the program and how you will be working with it. If you would like, you can just sit back and relax on this one and let me do all the work. Do not worry about missing anything yet. We will be sure to go over everything in detail in lessons to come.