Hone Your Skills On-line to Take Your Game to the Next Level
Balind on 25 Feb 2008 | Tips & Advice
I’ve recently become a huge fan of on-line training. I thought I had a well-rounded skill-set, then I met lynda.com. Now I’m convinced It’s just a matter of time before I can levitate monitors with my mind.
The beauty of on-line training is that unlike being in a class-room, if you gap out for a moment and miss something important, you just rewind. You can learn at your own pace. Skip the stuff you already know. Review anytime. Watch and do, simultaneously. It’s perfect.
School was fantastic for me. I was like a sponge for 3 years and it set the tone for the rest of my career… But, I wasn’t formally trained in any software other than Photoshop and Illustrator. I taught myself Flash, AE and 3DsMax on my own time, in fact, 90% of everything I learned during college was on my own time. For this reason there was actually a lot of mini-holes in my game. By reviewing my core software from a student-like perspective I’ve picked up many little tricks that are streamlining my work-flow in ways I wasn’t previously aware of. I was fast before but now I’m like lighting.
I also definitely recommend working alongside a group of talented and like-minded individuals such as the boys I have here at Red. You’ll find the more minds you have on any given problem, the more everybody learns.
harris on 27 Feb 2008 at 11:24 pm #
nice, online learning really is second to none.
YAPP on 28 Feb 2008 at 8:13 am #
Agreed, you can’t really beat it. My school had Lynda.com video tutorial CD’s. I watched a few on Actionscript 2.0…helped me out greatly. There’s no doubt, online learning from places such as Lynda.com is one of the best ways to learn, if not…the best. As you mentioned, you can rewind and rewatch and study it over and over. That’s what I love about Lynda.com or places such as gotoandlearn.com. Video tutorials are great.
I went to the Art Institute of Shaumburg (Chicago branch). You couldn’t be anymore right about the whole learning process. I didn’t learn a damn thing at school if I may be completely honest. Everything I learned I pretty much taught myself as well. You definetely have to take the initiative to learn and grow. Those kinds of schools just serve as foundations, they provide you with the programs and they teach you the ins and outs of it. Alot of the kids I went to school with figured the school was going to teach them everything and that it was going to find them a great job. So, they never took time outside of class to experiment and learn more than the basics that were being taught to them.
Going back to Lynda.com though, once again it’s probably the best learning tool out there. When it comes to our field, you don’t even need to go to school. You can pick up many Lynda.com CD’s and teach yourself, and as long as you work hard at it, the passion to learn and grow is there, and of course an added touch of talent…you’ll be successful if not more successful and knowledgeable than if you attended an art school.
Jason
Christian Kragh on 20 Jul 2008 at 5:11 am #
Hey there Balind. I’m pretty sure it’s my first post on here, so nice to meet you.
I’m a freelance Flash designer / developer (I’ve only been freelancing for 2 years though). I found your blog through Lee’s Flash Blog and I love your blog! Been checking out Red’s work for some time - amazing stuff.
Anyway, I agree too. I’m 20 years old so I actually took a web course in high school using dreamweaver and some flash. But almost everything I learned outside of school. I also went to university taking a multimedia design course, but left after one year because I already knew it and I wanted to pursue my freelance career.
I also agree on working with other minds - nice gig at Red huh? That’s why I’ve decided to get a job at a design firm somewhere so I can pick up some skills other than Flash (I only know a little HTML, CSS, PHP, etc). And I think you learn some neat tricks working with people that think differently than you - it just streamlines into great techniques and methods.
But thanks - I have definitely heard of lynda.com but haven’t checked it out properly yet, so now I think I’m gonna take a good consider about getting some lessons over at lynda.com.
Christian