yes, the tutorials are very good. Check out the rest of the site, too. There is alot of basic as well as advanced advide there.

Indeed, Luminosity (you can increase it beyond 100% ! to get a stronger effect) is another way to achieve the effect you are after. However, in order to get it to light up the environment, you need to use GI or Radiosity (if you want the color to be visible in the bounced light) for the render. That might be too expensive in terms of render time for an animation. Try some test renders and see.

Ciao

TD