After Effects for Windows & Macintosh

[Tami]

After Effects for Windows & Macintosh
Author: Antony Bolante
Review by: Shydragonchic

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I was excited to start reading this book, expecting to be able to start a project in the first couple of chapters and build on it as I progressed chapter by chapter. This was not quite the case. The first quarter of this book is very dry reading and intimidating to a novice user, like myself, or even an intermediate user who has not worked with all of the different types of media this program can incorporate. I was happy to reach the chapters that dealt with media I had worked with, and found it to be quite informative( when I had the background fundamentals already under my belt.)

Although it was designed for the intermediate to advanced user, this book provides both indepth technical background and easy to follow step by step pictures, screen shots and tips. It makes good use of side bars to explain important information for the step shown. Because this program uses elements from many different media, it doesn't go into the background fundamentals in depth. It does, however, give enough brief information on those fundamentals to give you a basic grasp of the task at hand.

With me being a very visual and hands on learner, I found that the best approach to this book, for me, was to follow the step by step pictures and when I came to a point that needed clarification to read the main body of text and refer to the sidebars liberaly sprinkled through the chapters. Although I wouldn't recommend this book for a novice user, as it does require some knowledge and experience of a wide variety of disciplines, for intermediate and advanced users, whatever your learning style, this is probably the only book you'll need to learn to use After Effects.