The DV Rebel's Guide is not going to be one of those books that suggests that guns have no place in indie films. On the contrary. In fact, I have such a pet peeve about badly-comped muzzle flashes that I am including a monster After Effects template project with the book. It works a lot like the old muzzle flash Fusion macro I made for DF4, in that all you have to do is paint some soft blobs in the rough areas where you want a muzzle flash and the comp does the rest. You have sliders to control the color, brightness, and heat distortion effects.
Plus, there's a full 3D particle system for the emission of spent shells. This is all rigged up with expressions so all you have to do is position a gun layer in After Effects 3D space and dial in the velocity, wind, and other settings.
All this for 25 bucks? Pre-order now so I get even more panicked calls from my publisher asking where my latest chapter is!
