Macworld: Review: Fireworks CS4 ...

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7 Replies Last post: Mar 10, 2009 10:09 AM by midlantica

Macworld

11,211 posts since
Nov 30, 2007

Nov 19, 2008 12:05 AM

Review: Fireworks CS4

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gnaihc

19 posts since
May 14, 2008

1. Nov 19, 2008 1:07 AM

in response to: Macworld

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

You can also create a fully interactive AIR application inside Fireworks CS4.

leicaman

1,585 posts since
Dec 4, 2003

2. Nov 19, 2008 6:31 AM

in response to: Macworld

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

I'm very impressed with this program, and pleasantly surprised it was included in the Creative Suite Design Premium. I would have never considered it if it hadn't come with what I was buying anyway, even at the $99 education price. But now that I have it, I'm anxiously looking for tutorials to learn how to create documents that can be sent to Flash or InDesign or Photoshop for various purposes.

My website is going to have a major upgrade! That makes it worth the money and time invested.

Shoot, I better watch out, I could become an Adobe fanboy. (But until they improve installation of apps, that won't happen.)

Eric

There are three kinds of men. The ones that learn by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence. - Will Rogers

Grapho

1,847 posts since
Aug 30, 2004

3. Nov 19, 2008 12:48 PM

in response to: Macworld

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

I learned Fireworks when it was in version 4 I believe, I had the first MX version that came after that too. I skipped the second MX and the first Adobe version.

I like this application a lot. but the problem that I am finding, and I am not sure weather it's a setting issue. The color from art created in it, even if meticulously defined equally does not match output from Photoshop. This is a show stopper if part of your work you do here and other stuff in Photoshop. I would assume that Adobe had addressed this, but so far I am having issues with that. I need to check the color settings to see if it's a discrepancy in some kind of ICC setting or what.

dougoftheabaci

538 posts since
Feb 2, 2007

4. Nov 19, 2008 5:08 PM

in response to: Macworld

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

I recently switched to using Fireworks a bit and while it's great for laying things out I have to disagree with Cyndy and say that it's text abilities are still pathetic, just as they always have been in Flash.

The problem lies in that it doesn't have many of the basic typographical controls you find in many of Adobe's graphics and print applications. Worse? They're features missing that can be rendered in a browser with CSS. Key among these to me is Small Caps. While not an obvious glaring issue it exemplifies the sorts of things you miss in Fireworks.

Right now I use it for wire-framing only, but it looks like that might not continue as I'm considering moving away from a wire-framing process to making prototypes instead.

gnaihc

19 posts since
May 14, 2008

5. Nov 19, 2008 5:11 PM

in response to: dougoftheabaci

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

You might want to try the CS4 version for the typography features. AFAIK, the latest version is using exact same type engine as Photoshop/Illustrator. You can save PSD files from Fireworks CS4 and open it in Photoshop with text unchanged (which was the case in CS3)

dougoftheabaci

538 posts since
Feb 2, 2007

6. Nov 19, 2008 5:23 PM

in response to: gnaihc

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

gnaihc wrote:
You might want to try the CS4 version for the typography features.

I have Creative Suite 4 installed on my system. The issue I have isn't that it imports files incorrectly but that you can't author certain things which I would consider to be basic. Full text controls as they would be available in a browser would be optimal considering that is the purpose of Fireworks.

The other apps I have no complaints about and think that Flash CS4 is full of very welcome changes. I just wish it and Fireworks would finally implement some decent text controls beyond the ability to import text correctly.

midlantica

42 posts since
Sep 16, 2004

7. Mar 10, 2009 10:09 AM

in response to: Macworld

Re: Review: Fireworks CS4

Adobe has has some serious issues with upgrades of Fireworks. I grew up in the Print world with PhotoShop and I'm an old pro on it, but I've always loved Fireworks for web work. There is no better. PhotoShop is like a 50 ton monster tractor with web functionality clumsily slapped on at the last minute. Fireworks is the lightweight elegant nippy Ferrari buy comparison, an elegant web-interface page builder.

I just wish Adobe would finish off the app properly. Whilst still very effective it is prone to crashing out of the blue. Bigger multi-page files definitely have more issues. Text boxes are jumping around pretty frequently, disappearing... Undo works about 85% of the time. Crashing when saving is horrifically common. Keyboard commands don't cycle...

But for all that I would still use Fireworks than the more finished app PhotoShop.

++++

Grrr.

And I'm going to keep on saying this till the end of time, Adobe where is my CS4 upgrade? Adobe's tech support is doggedly unhelpful and frequently incomprehensible. They've owed me an upgrade for some 6 months... When finally they sent the upgrade it was the wrong upgrade... And now they won't let me send it back... I'm flummoxed. One sensible person in support could have helped me and been done with it in a tenth of the time. Is Adobe's support really that much cheaper in the end?

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Nov 19, 2008 12:05 AM

Review: Fireworks CS4

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