Sometimes I hear “Adobe Fireworks? What it is for?” or “Why should I use Fireworks, if I use Photoshop/Illustrator?”.

Instead of answering that question, I’d like to show you the following illustration:

Mercedes SLA, drawn in Adobe Fireworks
— this vector illustration was created with Fireworks in 2005, by Fred Michel (unfortunately, I couldn’t find more information about its author) [download PNG editable file].

Or:

A compass, by David Hogue
— this illustration is by David Hogue, it was created a couple of days ago as a try to use similar technique as in an Illustrator tutorial [download PNG editable file].

Not bad results, eh? Especially for a program that is looked upon (by some) as an inferior alternative to Ai/Ps;-)

With Fireworks you can create some magical things or simple color effects. This is the ideal program for graphics for Web/screen — it combines the best of the bitmap and vector world. Fireworks is easier to use than Illustrator, it is even more easier than Photoshop. No, it is not free, but it is not expensive, either (it’s approximately 3 times less expensive than Photoshop, if I must be exact).

Some prefer GIMP. Others — Inkscape. Some creative professionals use only Illustrator and Photoshop. I remain a true fan of Fireworks and I would be happy, if Adobe will continue with its successful development…

My personal opinion is that for Web graphics and all graphic design tasks intended for use on screen (RGB/RGBa), Fireworks is the perfect tool! :-)

UPDATE (2009/Sep/23):

Illustration by Ryan Hicks, drawn in Fireworks
— I also forgot to show this excellent illustration by Ryan Hicks [download PNG editable file] (thanks, Jim!:-).
________________________
*Why Fireworks?
— a popular article by designer Stéphane Bergeron, published in Adobe Devnet.

2 thoughts on “Why Fireworks?*

  1. @Jim:

    Thanks, Jim! ;-)

    Actually, I posted only two examples, but it was intended rather as a quick blog post about Fireworks…

    I checked some of the work of Ryan Hicks. I even remember one illustration of Ryan, it caught my eye years ago at Devnet:
    http://www.adobe.com/devnet/fireworks/samples/xd_brownbag.html

    Do you know if all of his work is done with Fireworks? I have browsed his illustrations and find some of them extremely good!

    Thank you for the link! I may try to write a bit longer blog post about Fireworks and what it can do, at a later time;-)

    @JimBabbage to @optimiced: I’m not sure if all of it is done in #Fireworks, but a significant amount of it is, from what I understand.

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