Yes, I know that I’m repeating myself and I know that this is obvious to most of you. But apparently it’s not obvious to many and I think it’s worth repeating.
Recently I started to see a lot of the misconceptions about Fireworks I have been talking about here and which prompted me to write this article. Once again, Fireworks is NOT Photoshop (obvious) but more than that, Fireworks is not the same kind of application as Photoshop and this is not so obvious apparently…
Like I said, I’ve started coming into contact with many people for whom Fireworks is new or who have been working with it basically the same way they would work in Photoshop (yes I’m talking about this…). I think the simplest way this can be put is that Fireworks is just like Illustrator with some Photoshop-like functionality. But at its core it’s a vector based application just like Illustrator or FreeHand but unlike those two apps it can edit raw image pixels directly just like Photoshop. That makes Fireworks a hybrid vector/raster application with a primarily vector based workflow. Layers in Fireworks for example work like Illustrator’s NOT Photoshop’s (Fireworks layers contain “objects”, not just pixels). I’ll stop here for now but if you want more detailed information, read my article.
Thank you for finally putting down in an article everything thing that I feel about Fireworks. I have tried to convert everyone I know to Fireworks. These people are so dead headed against it though.
Now, there are people out there that are amazing at Photoshop. If you want to keep with PS, then that’s cool, I get it. But a lot of the people who are dead set on using PS are not even all that good at it. So what gives? Why is showing them how to use the infinitely easier to use Fireworks such a hard journey?
Anyway, great article!
One other thing to add to your article; I think that fact that Fireworks can create Flash-like symbols that can be reused and edited in one place is crazy sexy cool.
Hi Stéphane, thanks a lot for this article — I’ve always thought I should give Fireworks a try, since it’s on my computer anyway (i.e., came with DreamWeaver). So your article on the Adobe site will give me the push I need to put my beloved Photoshop security blanket aside for a while … merci!
Well said!
Thanks very much for your kind words guys. If my small contribution can help people realize just how powerful Fireworks really is then it will be worth it.
Btw, glad to see you here Alan! I haven’t sent you the reply I said I would yet but I have once more been battling back problems. I couldn’t be at the computer for more than a few minutes a day.