I can’t help it – I’m really excited about this. One of the really cool things about working at the Cambridge Center for Adult Education is that I occasionally get to sit in on a class.  I’ve chosen to sit in on Introductory Flash CS4 Professional with Susan Franz.

I’m so excited about this because I’ve been tinkering with Flash on my own – and lemme tell you: It. Is. HARD. Since I’ve had no formal training in any of my web design skills but have made it through a Master’s, it’s especially nice to learn it in a casual environment where grades are not the goal.  Plus, I grew up on the internet, so I’ve picked up a lot of things in the 15 or so years since my first Geocities page.

Today is our second four hour class, and just today, I’ve learned so much.  So I have to share it.  Here’s a page where I’ve put a couple of the projects we created today. It’s nothing much (and sorry for the massive files that seem to take forever to load), but seeing Susan show us how, then doing it in the lab really helps the understanding of all the pieces and parts of Flash that I never understood.  I just had to brag.

So what does this mean?  This means I’ll be able to create a new website with Flash elements sometime in the future.  You know, someday when I don’t have 8 million projects, assignments, and meetings to go to.  But it bodes well for being able to make the design I’ve created actually work.  Because now I understand.

Community education, for the win!