Reader’s Poll! Photoshop vs. Fireworks: Which One Do You Use?

Reader’s Poll! Photoshop vs. Fireworks: Which One Do You Use?

on Dec 7th 2010 with 128 comments

It’s time for another reader poll! This time, we’re asking you what graphics program you use for web design. Adobe Photoshop and Fireworks are the two main choices, but if you use GIMP, Xara, Ulead, Stone or design inline using code, we want to know about that too. We’ll be using the results (and comments!) to frame future tutorial material, so speak up now and let us know what you want to read here at the site!

Photoshop versus Fireworks

Photoshop versus Fireworks

Keep in mind that we’re asking about what you use on a day-to-day basis for graphics, not what program you use for coding (like Dreamweaver, Notepad, etc.). If you don’t use a graphics application (because you design inline while you code), select that checkbox :)

Let the Discussion Begin!

Don’t forget to leave a comment down below as well! These polls are great for quick-analysis, but we want to hear from you guys/gals to get a better understanding of the topic. Some discussion starters:

  • How do you normally work with the design/graphics phase on your own web design projects?
  • Do you use just one program, or many?
  • Have you tried out more than one program in the past?
  • If you design inline with code, explain why!
  • Are there any “unknown” programs that deserve attention from web design professionals?

Brandon Jones is MDNW on Themeforest
 
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Brandon Jones is the old Wptuts+ Editor. From sunny Southern California, Brandon has been designing, drawing, photographing, and coding the world around him for the past several years. Not content to pick one media and stick with it has left Brandon with a broad range of talents that have allowed him to work on projects ranging from grungy digital art kits to Fortune 500 software prototyping. He loves design, but even more, he loves the passion and creative spirit that embodies the design community. Check out Brandon's work at ThemeForest.  

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  • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
    Author

    I’ll start up the discussion by saying that I’ve used a combination of Photoshop and Illustrator for years now (using Smart Objects to port between the two) – but lately I’ve been trying out a bit of Fireworks to see what it’s all about.

    I’m honestly pretty entrenched with using Photoshop since it meets the level of graphical power/detail that I’m used to (and I’m familiar with it), but Fireworks is a pretty darned intriguing program because it’s designed with web-designers in mind. I can easily see lots of newer designers starting up with Fireworks because the learning curve on Photoshop might be higher than it needs to be for basic web design projects.

    We’re actually coming out with a few great tutorials for getting started with Fireworks this month, so keep an eye out – this poll is intended to gauge your guys’ interest in web design graphics apps :)

    Keep on discussing!

    • Mykl

      I was taught Fireworks but most use Photoshop too. I am glad to hear that there are some tutorials coming down the pipe with Fireworks in mind. I need the reminders! I was trained in web design but since college (5 years ago) I have been primarily a “Print Guy” for my employers and now I am becoming a combo of web and print with my current job… so the more the merrier I guess.

    • http://www.fiftyonestudios.com Colin Eberly

      I’ve tried numerous times to get into Fireworks, and it just never sticks for me. I feel like Photoshop can do pretty much the same things plus so much more. I keep going back to this discussion though because in the back of my mind something keeps saying “There’s got to be a reason to start using Fireworks… right?!”.

      I get the feeling that the people who are into Fireworks, or that get the most use out of it, are folks that came from a Flash background. The reason I say this is because app the interfaces used to be so similar. It seemed like if you were used to a Flash style workflow, then Fireworks would be really easy to pick up. I could be wrong, but from initial impressions, that’s the conclusion I came up with.

      In this day and age, I pretty much NEVER start any web project with code or layout. Sure, I go through scenarios in my head, but I always come up with a design in Photoshop to use as a foundation. When designing, I think about what kinds of functionality I am going to want to achieve, but always the design comes first. This is probably the biggest reason I use Photoshop.

      Don’t get me wrong though, some great stuff can be achieved with minimal Photoshopping and maximum CSS. Most of my clients thus far just haven’t opted to go with more semi-minimalistic designs that pure CSS would excel in.

      I’m looking forward to reading everyone’s take on the Photoshop vs. Fireworks debate though as I’ve always had this battle in my mind even though I never really got into Fireworks.

    • Robert Blair-Graham

      I actually use Illustrator for most of my Mock-Ups. I believe that it is a hell of a lot more intuitive than Fireworks, allows me to easily modify for print and as previously stated does well with Photoshop for editing using smart-objects, although it doesn’t play well with FW for customized gradients etc.
      One thing exciting that may sway me to use FW is the ability to copy-paste CSS3 code directly from Fireworks for all the border-radius, background-gradient and transparency so you no longer have to make endless amounts of JPEGs/PNGs or spend a lot of time trying to convert them into CSS code for each browser vendor.
      With the introduction of CSS3 and HTM5 I now believe FW is going to be the ‘tool of choice’ for most new web designers and rightly so.

  • http://twitter.com/sinnix Jeff

    I’ve been interviewing a lot of people over the past month and of those zillion people (rough estimate), NONE of them used Fireworks. Not even occasionally. This is going to be an easy Photoshop victory.

    Years ago, right before Adobe bought Macromedia I was talking with one of their (Macromedia’s) evangelists about why they didn’t take Fireworks more seriously and he straight up admitted there was no point because everyone would just use Photoshop anyway. Why spend the money on developing it more when it would just go to waste?

    Honestly, after Adobe bought them out I expected Fireworks to get phased out… but it’s still here! Why? I have no idea. I haven’t opened the program since Photoshop got the ability to make animated gifs (the only thing I ever used Fireworks for in the past).

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Jeff – to be honest, I fully expect this to be a Photoshop landslide as well – BUT, I will say that in our first month here at Webdesigntuts+ (back in October), there was a lot of interest being posted about Fireworks. While lots of people might be entrenched in Photoshop (like myself), there seems to be an underswell of interest in what Fireworks is and why Adobe bothers to keep it around in their stable of products.

      For many years it was the ugly stepchild competitor of Photoshop, these past years since Adobe bought Macromedia though, it seems to be picking up it’s own identity… and it might fully blossom into the better program over the next decade. If you consider that Photoshop can continue to grown increasingly more complex to tackle increasingly trickier photography/illustration tasks, it may very well out-grow it’s use for a good percentage web designers – which would make Fireworks the natural alternative if it’s done properly. Only time will tell though ;)

      • http://priostudio.co.cc Sisir

        Thanks Jones. I will be agree with you. The way i see into the future is photoshop will grow more strongly with graphic designing, painting and other stuff with 3d models. Surely those features will more enhanced in future and no doubt the options will grow enormously. Adobe then may be migrate some more of the photoshop feature to fireworks.

        Its might be a wild thought but it is possible to firework stands out as a webdesiging application. I myself have my strong background on graphic designing so i love photoshop very much as i use it all the time (its like my girlfriend ;) ! ). I even can’t remember when i last opened fireworks…

        Vote to Photoshop.. cheers!

  • Tim

    Remember when things were so much simpler? I miss Image Ready so much, I could just cry. Fireworks has its place, don’t get me wrong, but initially, I spent so much time trying figure out where things were, the terminology and work-arounds that I kinda gave it the finger. The CS4 and CS5 versions came along way from when I was first “forced” to use it. It’s grown on me, but still do a lot of the smaller things in good ol’ familiar Photoshop (Save for web and devices).

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Hah! It’s funny that mentioning Image-Ready is kinda like mentioning old-school boomboxes… but there was a time (not too long ago) that I used it on a frequent basis too :)

      And I totally agree on the note about Fireworks – for a program that’s supposed to simplify the way web design happens, my initial reaction when I fired up the program was profound confusion and a feeling of being lost. I think if designers hadn’t used either Photoshop OR Fireworks before, most people might gravitate towards Fireworks… but considering that most designers are comfortable and familiar with PS, it seems less than likely that there will be an exodus for that program until CS6 or 7.

      Thanks for the comment Tim!

    • http://vajaah.com Vajaah

      Oh Image Ready, how nostalgic! If most web designers were ONLY web designers then I think Fireworks could be a go to tool for the trade. In my experience, web designers often do graphic laden print work as well and Photoshop anchors both disciplines. As steer away from print and web design towards web and ui only pursuits, part of me wants to be convinced to embrace Fireworks.

      • Robert Blair-Graham

        Talking about nostalgia, does anyone remember Adobe PageMill? hehe.

  • http://www.earlstudios.com jeremy mayhew

    I started using fireworks v3 and back then photoshop was just to hard for me to learn, this was, coupled with flash, my first design software i ever used. there are just things i know how to do in fireworks that are more intuitive to me than they are in photoshop…

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Jeremy! That validates my other response about Photoshop being too UI-heavy for most web designers. It’s interesting to hear about your reasons for sticking it out with FW though – thanks again!

    • http://www.fiftyonestudios.com Colin Eberly

      This confirms my thoughts above on that it’s more familiar for someone coming from Flash to Fireworks rather than to Photoshop. Still, I feel like Flash is more user-friendly than Fireworks even now. I don’t know what it is exactly, but Fireworks for being the supposed “easy” tool, the interface gives me a headache. I haven’t really looked at FW since CS3 though so… who knows. Maybe it’s going to be the “go-to” tool for web in the future. Honestly though, I think that heavily complicated designs will always go through Photoshop.

  • http://www.nionwebdesign.com Niels Pilon

    I use Photoshop almost all the time and Illustrator for vector works like logo’s. Why? That’s the way I’ve learned it from the tutorials that are available on sites like this.
    I would like to give Fireworks a try because I’ve heard that it would be easier to use with less time. Haven’t tried it myself yet because of a lack of time and also the very limited amount of tutorials for Fireworks.
    From what I’ve seen Photoshop seems to be the standard in webdesign but if it’s the best tool for the job?

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Niels!

      I think a lot of people are just like you: They ended up using Photoshop – not because it’s “better” – but because of the readily available abundance of tutorials on a wide variety of graphics-related topics. While Fireworks is great for basic web design layout stuff, it still feels a little heavy handed for most designers to use for each and ever element on a page. I think most designers are always going to need Photoshop in some capacity to make detailed customization – even if Fireworks becomes better at other tasks. What’s interesting to consider is whether or not designers would rather just stick with one UI-heavy program (Photoshop) for everything, or if it’s easier to split up design between two programs and let each one excel at what it does best (graphics for PS, layout and image-prep for FW)

  • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
    Author

    It is worth saying that there is no “right” answer for this – Photoshop is the industry-accepted program in most cases, but I know a few people who use Fireworks exclusively and that’s fine because it works for them – and thanks to the CS suite, most of their projects open up fine in Photoshop and vice-versa. I’ve run into a few problems with pages and layer sets, but for the most part you can actually work in both if you want.

  • http://www.mrblonde.ca Mr. Blonde

    Although I’m still in the process of learning the finer points of web-design, I HAVE used both programs. I was used to photoshop so naturally I used that at first, but since I purchased the whole master collection of Adobe I wanted to try and get some use out of the other products.

    The thing I liked about Fireworks was the master page, I could design multiple pages based off of one master page. I also liked having raster and vector graphics on hand without having to switch programs.

    I will be honest I liked Fireworks better than Photoshop (cs4) for designing sites but since I’ve upgraded to CS5 I haven’t even touched fireworks and only use code.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Senor Blonde – We actually have a video tutorial on Master Pages coming out this month from Connor Turnbull ;) It happens to be my favorite part of Fireworks too – mainly because it’s the first major UI overhaul of any Adobe graphics products that is 100% targeted at web designers.

  • http://bkmacdaddy.com Brian McDaniel

    I think a big part of the reason people stick with one or the other is because it is what they learned on. I taught myself web design back in the 90′s using Dreamweaver & Fireworks because they were what was available where I was working. Now years later I still use Fireworks for almost all of my web design projects and Photoshop for other types or more intense designs. I remember when I first started using Photoshop it was overwhelming in comparison to Fireworks, yet some of the same comments have been made here in the reverse. We usually tend to stick with what’s comfortable and works for us, I guess.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      I totally agree Brian – we’re creatures of habit, so we’ll often stick with the same program that we learned on unless someone pries it out of our cold, dead hands (so to speak, haha!). So much of this discussion is about “which one is better”, when the answer to “which one do you actually use” has more to do with what people are familiar with.

  • http://jasonbobich.com Jason

    I would say Fireworks is awesome in setting up all your images to be exported… while Photoshop only has “slicing” which is totally outdated…. but other than that I like Photoshop for every other reason you could think of :-)

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Jason – I agree with you – PS seems to cover all of the major graphic needs, while Fireworks has some great features that theoretically make your life a lot easier. Now, if Adobe could merge the two, that’d be awesome. (IE: The ability to run Photoshop in “Fireworks / Web Designer” mode).

  • http://line-in.co.uk Simon

    Ha ha , I hope you’re ready for a flame war…

    For what it’s worth, I use Photoshop to design but that doesn’t mean it’s ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ – it’s just the tool I happen to use, and what ultimately counts is the end result.

    Doesn’t matter how we get there, just that we get there.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Hah! We haven’t had any unruly commenters yet, but I’ll happily employ the “unapprove comment” button if things get personal. Actually – now that you mention it, people here have been remarkably polite – good job everyone! We’ve got work to do to make up for YouTube commenters’ negative postings though ;)

      Thanks for the comment Simon! (and I agree – it’s not how you get there with web design, it’s that you get there at all).

  • http://www.futurodesign.no Sam J.

    I mostly work in Photoshop.
    But i do use Illustrator and Cinema 4D as secondary programs, since some elements are more easily created in those.

    Never really got into using fireworks and don’t see any major benefits using it over Photoshop.

    Using multiple programs can have it benefits.

    For example:

    I am no expert in 3D software, mostly use them for small things like typography and simple graphics.
    I found CB modeller pro to be extremely easy for simple 3d models, but it didnt have the render power of cinema 4d.

    So i make the object in CB modeller pro and final rendering in cinema 4d.

    I also use Illustrator and Photoshop in the same fashion.

    • http://www.fiftyonestudios.com Colin Eberly

      I’m not going to try and hijack this whole thing, so I’ll reply to this since it pertains to 3D.

      Has anyone really even gotten into using the 3D tools etc. that Photoshop now provides? I still find myself going back to native 3D modelling apps to get 3D stuff done and rendered. I’m really curious to see if anyone actually prefers trying to do 3D work inside of PS over dedicated 3D apps.

  • Dylan

    Those should be mutually exclusive radio buttons – not checkboxes.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      I agree, except Polldaddy won’t let me fill in text to the “Other” field – so this way people can fill out Other as well as the Gimp… option :)

  • http://heavymark.com Christopher

    They are two very different applications.

    If you are working with Photos you use Photoshop. If you are working with just vectors you use Illustrator. If your using a combination of the two (photos/vectors) more so vectors, you would use Fireworks. Which is why Fireworks is built for doing web design mockups.

    These days (as the results show above), most people however use Photoshop for everything because they know it so well. Because even though Fireworks may be better for web design mockups using a tool you don’t know like the back of your hand would ultimately cause you to be a lot less productive.

    Moral, if your just starting out, use the right program for the right task. If you grew up using one program, and you know how to get it to do everything you need, then keep using that. Tools are just here to help us.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Christopher – I would have agreed with you on this a few years ago, but now your classification of Fireworks as a go-between for Illustrator and Photoshop isn’t quite accurate. It was once the case, but now Adobe is framing it’s identity as a Web Design partner for Dreamweaver than anything else.

      I will agree with you on the point that most people just use Photoshop for everything simply because of their familiarity with it – much can be said for having experience with a program – most people will always choose the “known evil” rather than branch out and try something new (I do this too, so that’s not intended to be criticism).

      Cheers!

  • http://www.johnernaut.com johnernaut

    I pretty much anticipated the results. I find designing in code however particularly interesting. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve coded a sites ‘general’ layout and then went to photoshop to make graphics to fit in until it looks good. Maybe it’s not the best way to do things, but seems to help designers block.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Johnernaut – I agree that it’s good every once in a while to shake up your usual workflow with things like “designing in code” or starting out in a sketchbook.

  • GJAdmiraal

    Although the majority of people will use the Adobe software, I think it’s worth mentioning that for starters or the more-code-then-design people you have Pixelmator.

    Even though it lacks the vector-drawing mode, you can do some nice things for a quite reasonable price. And I have to say the interface feels more natural and easier to use.

    In the past, I guess that would have been 6 years ago, I had used Fireworks for almost anything I did with graphics. And after 5 years of being idle on web development and switching from a PC to a Mac, I started with Pixelmator months ago, but obtained Photoshop recently.

    I missed the vector-drawings and was convinced by tutplus that Photoshop did fit a lot better for most of the design you will create.

    But when I have to pick a donkey to work with, horses are for the better people out there, it would depend on the time, the job and the mood I’m in.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment GJ – There are quite a few other applications out there that are probably worth mentioning at some point in time (like PixelMator) – the fact that they even attempt to go up against the “big guys” at Adobe is noteworthy.

      It is interesting to hear from someone who consistently uses one of these lesser used programs though – thanks for posting!

  • http://www.movieviews.be Dennis

    I use them both. I make my design in Photoshop and I use Fireworks to slice my designs. The slicing tool of FW works much better than the slice tool of PS.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Dennis – that’s actually a pretty interesting workflow – I’ll have to try this out myself in one of my new projects.

  • Thiago

    Man, there are toooons of Photoshop tutorials out there…

  • http://www.koyotedesign.com J. Revuelta

    I mostly use Photoshop, say 95% of the time, but many of my graphics elements, backgrounds above all, come from Pixelmator. I think you guys/gals should give a try to that tiny piece of software, maybe you’ll come across a great surprise! (In fact I’m designing a mockup layout in Pixelmator just now :))

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      You’re the second person to mention Pixelmator – I’ll have to check it out this week :) Thanks for the comment J!

  • Stephen

    I heard Fireworks renders text closer to the web. Which I love. But I still use Photoshop…. which explains why my text never works out how I wanted.

  • Brock Nunn

    I have tried to dedicate myself to fireworks, because I feel that it is lighter, and seemingly easier to wire-frame designs. However, I just keep on coming back to Photoshop for sheer flexibility and pixel point accuracy.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      I’m in the same spot Brock – as much as I really believe that Fireworks should be the way of the future for web designers, I keep coming back to Photoshop for layouts. The fact that they keep adding new features that are useful to web designers in PS doesn’t help motivate me to change my ways, haha!

  • http://www.southmakers.com Alvaro

    I´m into web design several years ago. I remember the first site I made, I did it completely using MS Paint!… needless to say that was a nightmare.

    Then, a friend told me about an awesome tool called “Fireworks” from the same guys who created Flash, enough reason to try it and I loved it then! I rebuilt the entire interface of my first website using it, I remember a nice wood texture and some animated gifs (yes, animated gifs!) and kept that visual layout for a couple of years.

    But later on, when I started designing for real clients, some of them wanted to have a visually stunning graphics, silly things like creating a Layer Mask to fade out a picture merging it with another was easiest to achieve in Photoshop, there´s when I realized the limitations of Firewors as a Graphic Design tool.

    I migrated my process to Photoshop then and I´m still using it, but now working with some projects which require display lots of data like charts, tables, lists, etc the process is becoming very difficult in Photoshop, so I will take some time to explore this feature back to Fireworks and see if I can work with both tools in parallel.

    I think no matter which tool you use, the important things are on your head, if you´re a creative and smart designer there no such thing like “the best tool”, nevermind if you have Photoshop, Fireworks, Illustrator, or even Gimp, if you know what are you doing the result will be stunning!

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the comment Alvaro! Wow – web design in MS paint sounds a lot like web design using a stone tablet and chisel ;) I like your comment here though:

      I think no matter which tool you use, the important things are on your head, if you´re a creative and smart designer there no such thing like “the best tool”, nevermind if you have Photoshop, Fireworks, Illustrator, or even Gimp, if you know what are you doing the result will be stunning!

  • Bryan

    I use Photoshop for almost everything, but within Windows I find sometimes on occasion instances where it refuses to do certain things (eg. copying an item someone sends me in a MS Word document) that Fireworks actually will do. I also use Fireworks to produce PNG8+Alpha transparency that Photoshop doesn’t do, I still find it incredible that these packages comes from the same company but that one package supports this and the other does not, very strange.

    Also, because I work in both web and print worlds, Photoshop is the only solution for me with its support for CMYK mode. My recent upgrade at work to CS5 has been a dream with the content aware features which are just FANTASTIC!!

    • http://www.twitter.com/herihehe Heri Hehe

      It seems that i gotta have a shot at fireworks for the png8-transparency. But why doesn’t it come to Photoshop?. I mean, come on Adobe, why bother opening Fireworks just to get this simple task done… ~ ~

      • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
        Author

        Funny – maybe they designed it like that on purpose… keep some web-specific functionality on FW and not PS to force people to open it up ;) I’m going to guess that’s not the actual reason – but one can create conspiracy theories ;)

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  • R Marlatt

    I use Photoshop about 65% of the time. Menu bars, rollover effects etc are great in Fireworks. If they could combine the REAL Photoshop layer effects in Fireworks it would go one notch higher in my book. One thing I will admit is that if you learn the interface in Fireworks you can work pretty fast. I would definitely like to see some tutorials on Fireworks especially web layout. I don’t think I would completely ditch Photoshop.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      If they could combine the REAL Photoshop layer effects in Fireworks it would go one notch higher in my book.

      +1

      And we hear you loud and clear about wanting more Fireworks tutorials – we’ll be coming out with more of these this month :)

  • http://leandroacosta.com/portfolio/ Leandro

    Have tried FW a few times with no real sense of what the benefits vs PS are. I find I design and slice 10x faster with PS, plus PS now has the “content-aware” feature, have you guys seen that?? So cool! It still amazes me :)

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Hi Leandro – good comment – We’ll be publishing articles over the next month that should help to identify the main benefits of Fireworks (and the benefits of Photoshop) – but when it comes down to it, most people will use whatever program they are most comfortable with simply because they are more familiar and can move quicker :)

  • Tobias Jurga

    I know that Fireworks is probably better for webdesign but still i use Photoshop, but I guess it’s just because i got used to it and I’m too lazy to learn something new…

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Eh – it’s not laziness – it’s practicality: if you have a program that works for your needs, why bother changing? I think that’s the main problem that Fireworks is facing at the moment – they really need to make a persuasive argument to Photoshop web designers to make the change.

  • 3dan

    I use Illustrator CS5 for most of the web graphics (including slicing … – I know is not the most efficient)
    If I need some heavy image editing, Photoshop.
    Fireworks is kind of “underpowered’ especially working with vectors.
    The only things I like at Fireworks are page templates and slicing.
    PNG-24 export from Illustrator is giving me the smallest file sizes even with placed images.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Very interesting! I don’t hear many people that use Illustrator for web design – but thanks for posting and letting us know that someone out there is using it :) I use Illustrator all the time for creating custom shapes, but I always port them back into my layouts in Photoshop.

      • 3dan

        check my site 3dan.ca (all graphics done in illustrator)
        I’m working now on a big site using the same technique. Still in dev, but I’ll give you the link when is up.
        Workflow is not very important to me right now as I just inching my way up in webdesign.

  • Tom Green

    I’m a Fireworks guy and have been so for at least 10 years, so that’s on the table.

    The choice between PS and FW isn’t product preference. It comes down to workflow: Which tool is best suited for the job at hand.

    I use FW because:

    The workflow between FW , Illustrator and Catalyst is seamless thanks to FXG.

    I can prototype an AIR app with very light functionality right out of FW.

    Wire framing and comps are a dream- HTML and/or Interactive PDF right out of FW.

    FW can open PS and Ill files.

    Slicing,dicing and HTML/CSS export is far superior.

    In a recent Society of Digital Agencies (SODA) job skills survey almost 20% of agencies are looking for FW skills.The year before the number was so small as to be negligible.

    Drag a functioning FW symbol into Flash and it becomes a fully functioning Flash symbol.

    Batch processing out of FW is faster and easier.

    As for learning something new,,,, Lynda.com has a great training series and the Fireworks Classroom in a Book series (CS4 and CS4( aren’t bad. I have done a whack of FW tutorials at Layersmagazine.com and CommunityMX and there are an increasing number of FW tute sites out there. Fireworks is gaining traction as a prototyping tool and will never replace Pshop.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Fantastic comment Tom – you’ve illuminated a number of the things that I think a lot of Photoshop heavy users are interested in knowing about Fireworks. Would you be interested in expanding this out into a full article? Email me at webdesign@tutsplus.com :)

  • Pingback: Reader’s Poll! Photoshop vs. Fireworks: Which One Do You Use? | San Francisco Design & Technology Magazine

  • http://www.youfounderic.com Eric Kelly

    I’d like to see some tutorials or at least examples of what Fireworks can do better or more intuitively than Photoshop. I’ve tried a few times to get into Fireworks but I cant really find any reason to use it over Photoshop.

    • Mike

      same here. I don’t get the point why I should switch over to fireworks. Photoshop does it all…

  • http://www.mrare.ca Bryan Maniotakis

    I use fireworks for wireframing only. It’s a really great tool to utilize because of it’s superior ‘layer comp’ type features (states/pages), so it’s much faster to crank out frames.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Interesting – I never really thought about it – but FW would be faster for Wireframing and Prototyping projects.

  • http://www.sz-media.org Sz-Media

    sounds like a “how to start with fireworks” tutorial :)

  • http://www.woony.be woony

    I’m a FW enthousiast for many years. And the reason is just it is soo simple, quick and easy to use. Especially for webdevelopment. Slicing goes super fast, etc. For the stuff I need to do with graphics as a ‘frontend’ developer fireworks is just the #1 choice and I can just easily open .PSD files straight from the designer.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Nice! Thanks for the comment Woony!

  • http://www.redhotminute.com Al

    When you really get into Fireworks you’ll notice that there are many things going on there wich make your webdesign life better. Working with pages, having an image library and styles are just a few things wich makes fireworks a better app for webdesign. Still, Photoshop is the best app for making nice images but the way I see it Fireworks is what Indesign is for print: Just great.

    • http://galengidman.com/ Galen Gidman

      Right, there are a lot of things in Fw that you won’t realize are there unless you use it regularly that make life great for a web designer.

  • http://www.anoncreative.com Danny

    I used Fireworks through college and into university, however any of my university tutorials and tasks were set in Photoshop and so I had to make the transition, havnt really looked back. Its been so long since I’ve worked with Fw now that I cant even use it half as fast as I can Ps.

    Its just down to what your most used to alot of the time, I cant really take the time to try and re-learn Fw as it’ll just slow down my workflow and I can get everything I want done in Ps so I see no reason for me personally to use Fw at all.

  • http://www.markdijkstra.eu Mark Dijkstra

    All these years that i have been doing this work i almost never used fireworks

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Same here – I’ve been opening it up a lot more often now that we’re about to start publishing some tuts for it, but as a creature of habit, I’ve been a longtime Photoshop fan for web design. I suppose the great news for guys like us is that both are made by the same company… so at least the general UI is similar (even if I did feel lost the first time I opened up Fireworks CS5).

      Thanks for the comment Mark.

    • http://www.markdijkstra.eu Mark Dijkstra

      Fireworks is an nice tool, but i dont see the need to learn it, because almost everything that i do, can be done with photoshop. Learning a new program/tool cost time, and time is money……

      I think that you can do the job by using only photoshop and dreamweaver(lets stay in the adobe cloud).

      And yes they are from the same company but they still work different, which i find one of those bad things about fireworks(and illustrator)

      • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
        Author

        Learning a new program/tool cost time, and time is money.

        Well put – I think that’s one of the best reasons for any experienced designer to stick it out with Photoshop. If it ain’t broke, why bother?

        I’ll be exploring the features of FW in the future here on WDT, but I think your argument poses the biggest hurdle for most web designers Mark – unless there is a real value pitch in terms of expedited functionality, better results, and a smoother workflow, very very few people (myself included) will bother switching away from what they are used to. My goal certainly isn’t to convince anyone one way or another – but I hope our articles in the future will at least help to illuminate these issues for anyone who isn’t firmly entrenched yet.

  • http://realcostdomains.com Steve

    I learned Fireworks in school (10 years ago) and still use it for small image modifications or to resize an image just because it loads much quicker on my computer. Yes – I believe Photoshop will stay on top in a 10:1 advantage.

  • http://galengidman.com/ Galen Gidman

    I’m a huge Fw fanboy. I think that the biggest reason I like it so much is because it was built for web design, whereas Ps was built for photo editing. I’m guessing that at some point I’m going to have to actually learn Ps, but for now I’ll stick with Fw — it’s just so much easier.

    I should also mention that knowing Fw made learning Ai very easy.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Interesting comment about how using FW made learning illustrator easier – thanks Galen!

  • http://www.theroyalweisus.com Luke Swenson

    Which is faster and more efficient? Photoshop or Fireworks?

    If you take into consideration all the small non-design tasks (i.e. exporting mockup/previews, cutting up images/development for development, making client edits to universal elements), Fireworks might be faster.

    I prefer Photoshop, but I am comfortable with it.

  • http://www.bobbyblack.cc Bobby

    Back in the day, I was trained in college to be a print designer. To stay current in the industry, in recent years I had to learn web design. Yet, because of my print background I was extremely familiar with designing in Photoshop and Illustrator. Many times I would create all of my vector line art in Illustrator and then port those elements over into Photoshop for further refining. This process has worked very well for the last 9 years or so.

    However, I was always frustrated by two major things:

    1). Photoshop has such a lightweight (dare I say “sloppy”) version of vector path object control. Smart Objects aside, it can be extremely painstaking at times to edit a complex vector object within the Photoshop application.

    2). While Illustrator gives you great control over vector line art, it really does not have any serious image editing abilities.

    Recently, on a whim, I decided to give Fireworks a spin after hearing some positive things from other designers and I have to say that I am equally impressed. It saved me a lot of time and energy by not having to switch back forth between apps for vector line art and image editing. I can do the entire design process—from simple wireframe to high-fidelity composition—in Fireworks!

    I really love that each object in Fireworks is essentially a vector object that I can quickly refine and then add filters, textures, and borders to easily. Stuff that would normally take a number of layers and filters to accomplish in Photoshop can rapidly be done in one object with Fireworks.

    Also, I really like the fact that Fireworks offers the ability to create Master Pages for quick duplication of common elements like a header and footer section. Making a change to a Master Page allows you to quickly edit all the pages connected to that Master Page at the same time.

    My only gripe about Fireworks so far, is that the type rendering is about the same as it is in Photoshop. For those of us who are used to the Photoshop UI, Fireworks can be challenging at first to figure out where everything is and how to use it. Fireworks is also a bit buggy and it quickly becomes clear that Adobe needs to make some serious investment into this program if it is going to be successful in the future.

    Fireworks has saved me so much time and has quickly become by go-to application for web design stuff. If you haven’t opened it in a while, give it another look. You might be pleasantly surprised. :)

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      My only gripe about Fireworks so far, is that the type rendering is about the same as it is in Photoshop.

      Hah! I couldn’t agree more – the text rendering has always been ghastly in Photoshop. It blows my mind that Adobe hasn’t addressed this one yet. Having just a handful of aliasing options is absurd when you can fine tune the rendering settings to your heart’s content in Flash.

      I’d love to even see some different rendering options that attempt to match Browser and OS – text rendering is always different in Safari on a Max than it is on an old Windows machine.

  • JohnBoy

    I primarily use Fireworks anymore. Like most I started with PS but then forced myself to mess with FW for a couple personal projects. It makes so many things easier & faster than PS.

    Want a 240px X 300px with rounded corners?
    FW – Draw your box – adjust numeric properties and your done. Place it’s XY positioning again with numeric properties.
    PS – Set up guides, select rounded rectangle shape tool, draw your box. Crap – the rounded corners aren’t right. Delete the layer, punch in the new value, draw it again.

    This is just one minor example of speed savings once you get used to FW. Then there are Pages, States, Align & Styles palette that really make FW a web designers BFF. It’s the perfect marriage between Photoshop & Illustrator built with the web designer in mind.

    But to each there own. I suggest those that haven’t worked in FW much to really give FW CS5 a whirl. I look forward to see what kinds of Tuts show up here for

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Interesting thoughts John – I’ll be sure to include your example in our future post comparing Fireworks and Photoshop :) I certainly can relate to the speed savings example… as I have to use the PS method that you’ve suggested (and yes, it’s annoying that you can’t change a shape’s inherent parameters, like rounded corners, in PS after you’ve created it).

    • Matthias Krok

      I completely agree. Especially these “small tasks” that every webworker has to do every now and then are much more intuitive and quicker in Fireworks. Be it adding round corners, dropshadows or a glow, rotating or scaling images – these are simple tasks where you don’t need the full blown Photoshop.

      As a webdesigner / webdeveloper I rarely do some actual “creative image editing” like you can probably only do in Photoshop. But I frequently need something to do these simple tasks like adding a shadow or something. Maybe there are other tools like Picturesque for these simple tasks, but they don’t offer the flexibility to do “something more”. Maybe I usually only add shadows, but every once in a while I like to use the automatic color/contrast adjustment filter in Fireworks which Picturesque doesn’t have.

      I’d like to compare Photoshop with MS Word (probably I will get flamed for that ;-) ): If you just want to write some text, some notes, some ideas, you don’t open Word, do you?

      I usually write text in some editor like TextWrangler, as an Email, in some rich text editor like in Together or even Apple Notes. But I would never think “I want to write something down, so first I start up Word.” (or Pages). Actually I only use MS Word (sorry, OpenOffice Writer in my case) to open DOC files that I get sent by email.

      The same for Photoshop: I use Photoshop mostly to open PSD files that I get by email. Usually I save it as PNG first and everything else in Fireworks.

      There is, however, one thing where I found Fireworks to “fail”: I wanted to change the color angle (hue) of an image constisting mostly of blue gradients while some other effect filters where active too. In Fireworks this resulted in a poor quality result (pixelated rainbow effect) while Photoshop did the job just fine. Probably that has something to do with the fact, that Photoshop renders stuff internally with a higher precision (64bit?) while Fireworks doesn’t.

      So my point is: If you need to do some “heavy image work”, it might be possible that Photoshop is the only one who can do it “right”. But something like 98% of the “image editing work” I have to do as a webdesigner / developer can be done in Fireworks – probably with less clicks and time.

  • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
    Author

    I wanted to post an interesting trend so far:

    Designers in English speaking countries seem much more likely to use Photoshop (only 5% use FW according to the poll) – where nearly 20% of people in non-English speaking countries claim Fireworks as their graphics app of choice.

    Anyone have any ideas why this might be?

  • http://tkukurin.tumblr.com Toni Kukurin

    @Brandon: A coincidence? :) But really, I’m not sure. Perhaps Photoshop is advertised more in English-speaking countries (I believe most of them were from USA?).

    As for me, I like to use both.

    I see Photoshop as a robust, heavy machine which is filled with options and features, of which many aren’t really necessary for Web-design most of the time. You could compare it to an airplane command-board used in a car. OK, but what do I do with the rest of the switches?!

    On the other hand, Fireworks is lightweight, allows me to move objects freely in space (not too many mumbling with layers) but lacks some of the essential features Photoshop has. While an initial mock-up might be the perfect job for Fireworks, switching to the “heavy-duty” should probably be done in Photoshop.

    Something like a SUV (PS) vs. a smaller “city-drive” car (FW)

  • http://wwola.co.uk mohammed

    i use fireworks it’s great for both photo and vectors designs for web i don’t use it for any animations only for web layouts great lightweight app i hate photoshop all that slicing i usually code my layout then use the images to fill the layout out just my two cents i guess fireworks has to have a place in webdesign seriously it’s a great app for web design you get the taste of both world vector and raster together

  • http://sharonchambers.me Sharon

    Having a background in programming, I learned to use Fireworks back when Macromedia still owned the design suite. It was more intuitive and I could quickly get some basic ideas together. Plus, since I was designing for the web anyway, a resolution of 72 pixels per inch was sufficient.

    Now that I have expanded both my design skills, as well as design objectives (ie, designing for print and/or outdoor advertising), I have expanded my horizons to more tools for whatever purpose. I now design/edit comfortably in Fireworks, Photoshop, and Illustrator, depending on my project needs.

    Having said all this, my design process–no matter what the purpose–almost always follows this process:
    1) paper, pencil, pastels
    2) Fireworks – initial digital “proof of concept”
    3) Either continue in Fireworks, or switch to Illustrator, Photoshop as needed.

  • Pingback: Photoshop versus Fireworks: A Guide for Web Designers | Webdesigntuts+

  • http://freddygcano.com Freddy Cano

    I think Fireworks is great. It can save you so much time.

    1. No Math require. When setting guidelines in PS you always need to be adding or counting the pixels to know where to drop the guidelines. In FW you can just hold SHIFT and it will tell you the distance in between guidelines.

    2. Keeping track of your layers and naming each one is less of an issue. FW lets you lock/unlock your layers and folders easily. There is really no need to be naming each element since you can just put everything in the folder layer and select each element when you click on them.

    So far those are the biggest reasons why I like FW more, but I still use PS but some of the image manipulation, since I still don’t know everything about FW, since there is a lack of tutorials; Lynda has only about 3 or 4 of them, and tuts+ just got one recently so I know of only 5 tutorials vs 1000+ of PS.

  • Nell

    Fireworks is good – but it’s hella laggy and that drives me insane!
    Great for wireframing, but the lagginess just drives me nuts!

  • john

    and the follow-up question would be – how many of you have actually paid for the Photoshop License? It’d be interesting to see the results – just for fun. As I’ve read somewhere that Adobe products are the most pirated ones!

  • Carlos

    This guy from digitallabs.tv and augustinteractive.com seems to use only Fireworks for his projects and his work is stunning! You guys from Webdesign Tuts should invite him for writing some FW tutorials ;) Just a tip!

  • Kim Dolleris

    Definitely PS. I tried FW once for doing some wireframes. It quickly became a very large and laggy file. I cant see any benefits in making whole designs i FW. And whatever short cuts FW might have – i’m sure the goals are easely achieved in PS aswell.

    I wasnt aware that FW is better at compressing stuff though… This might actually make me pull some stuff through.

    Normally (like alot here): PS+AI » Text Mate

  • http://www.angryoaf.com AngryOaf

    I use Photoshop more often for actual graphic/interface design but after I’ve completed compositions of the “look and feel” of the site I’m working on, I import everything into fireworks for it’s exceptional web oriented features and I do most of my slicing in FF simply because I find the slicing tool to be much more intuitive and user friendly.

    I think the way FF easily moves between vector graphics and raster images and it’s web centric features ingenious, but at the end of the day; I’m more familiar with Photoshop’s interface, features, and general methodology.

  • http://www.web2feel.com/ Jinson

    My vote is for Photoshop. I’ve been using it since PS5. I have played with FW also back then, but I think what keep Photoshop steps above the rest is the process of evolution it has undergone over the years. Back then we had to switch between Image ready and Photoshop to make animated and static graphics. Now in the creative series they have brought every cool feature available under one roof.

    Another reason why I possibly tagged along with PS through these years could be the universal acceptance it received among the graphic designer community. Back then ( and I still) relied heavily on tutorials, tips and tricks posted by the experienced senior designers. And there would be 100 cool Photoshop tutorials against 10 tutorials on fireworks. But that being said, I do not have the audacity to say that FW is obsolete. But Photoshop rocks.

  • http://www.reinegger.net Andre Reinegger

    After reading of this article there should be no more discussion. Here comes 50 good reasons to prefer Fireworks.

    http://www.reinegger.net/50_reasons_not_to_use_photoshp_for_webdesign.html

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Thanks for the link Andre!

  • Francesco

    I use Fireworks for web design since version 2. I also use photoshop, but only for photo retouch.
    I think photoshop stay to the webdesign as notepad stay to web development. Its good for who doesn’t care about the efficency.
    As in my day-to-day job efficiency is a crucial point I’ll never use photoshop.
    Working with other people I’ve never find someone that can be quick with photoshop the same I am with fireworks, doing the same thast, with same quality results.
    But you know: people are lazy, and as a lot of designers came from prepress design or photo retouche, they don’t want to run on the initial learning curve of fireworks.
    In fact most of them doesn’t really know what is the logic and features of fireworks.
    This is my 2 cents.
    Francesco-

  • rizalmovic

    i work use adobe illustrator for the most.. well, some times i had to switch to photoshop to achive some effects. And if i need a simple & lite tools, i’ll go with fireworks and do the code.. i’ts more simple and lite..

  • http://qazware.com Quoc Anh

    I think FW easy to use than PS it’s better than for webdeisgner. sometime I swicth to PS but I most use FW.
    I hope we need to have more FW tutorials

  • http://www.webdesignkc.co.uk/ rory

    I mainly use photoshop and hard code most of my web design work, but I do use Firefox for my prototypes. Very quick and easy to slice up flat images and do quick over states. But it adds far too much code for my liking to use Fireworks anymore than that.

  • Dave

    I’ve been using Photoshop since v4.0 so it’s a no-brainer for me. Although I’m also pretty savvy with Illustrator, I’ve tried a couple times to get into the Fireworks thing, and YES, there are absolutely some cool features that really streamline the workflow, like how the pages work in comparison to layer comps, or the quick drawing tools and available effects.

    I for one would really enjoy learning Fireworks, if only for those few moments in the day when you realize that you can shave off a few minutes here and there by jumping to a tool that has that process refined.

    Having another tool at your disposal is always helpful – I can’t wait to see the tuts.

  • Eric

    I typically start a sketch in Photoshop, but move to Fireworks for the entire export process, and some of the design work too. FIreworks is infinitely better than Photoshop for tasks such as creating crisp, rounded boxes & borders, exporting PNGs with various quality & transparency options, setting up rollover states.. working with a hex color palette, Plus, you can re-edit the text in a Fireworks PNG, so you don’t have to maintain a separate source file (i.e. PSD) and web file for each graphic with text.

    Finally, Fireworks almost ALWAYS generates a smaller file than Photoshop, regardless of file type.

  • http://www.penncomm.com Matt

    For web development, I very rarely open PhotoShop anymore. Fireworks is my tool of choice. It’s fast, simple, and clean.

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Interesting – thanks for the feedback Matt!

  • http://www.techwench.com techwench

    i go with photoshop from starting into this field i was using it
    so i go with it
    thanks!!!
    ……

  • http://www.masteradobe.com Thomas Benner

    Although I understand where your question is coming from, I also think it is misleading. Photoshop is the best raster image editor. Illustrator is the best vector graphic editor. Currently, Adobe is promoting Fireworks as a Wireframing and Prototyping tool. Fireworks allows the user to combine raster and vector at the same time (unlike either Photoshop or Illustrator) and has wonderful tools (autoshapes, commands menu, javascript behaviors, easy GIF animation and slicing). Fireworks CS5 is very compatible with Photoshop and Illustrator. I may do some work in Photoshop and Illustrator but if my project involves screen graphics, I bring it into Fireworks for fine tuning.

    I teach Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash and Fireworks courses at a college and consider all these wonderful tools in my “utility belt”. I would never consider Photoshop and Fireworks as competitors (they are too different) but rather as great tools that work seamlessly together. I have found that some projects can be done quickly in Fireworks in a few steps that take a long time in either Photoshop or Illustrator.

    Also, Fireworks is a great tool for generating graphics for Flash projects as well as web pages and RIA’s (rich internet applications).

    Greg Rewis, chief web evangelist at Adobe, is a big Fireworks fan (he worked with Fireworks at Macromedia back before the big buyout) and does some good training videos at Adobe’s web site illustrating how Fireworks fits in the web flow as I mentioned above.

    I think any designer/developer who omits learning Fireworks is missing out on a valuable tool. That’s my take and “Long Live Fireworks!” :¬)

  • David
  • http://www.thebicyclesite.com Glenn

    Being a Fireworks user who found PS frustrating, I took a college level course in PS about a year ago.

    The reality is both duplicate each other in many areas.

    What I have found is:
    …FW is easier to use and more intuitive I dan do things in FW with 1-3 commands that take a lot more time in PS.
    …Exporting to CSS and HTML is a snap in FW
    …FW handles bitmap and raster graphics simply
    …PS seems to have more tools for indepth photo manipulation, but in web design this is not always important.
    …PS has more built in filters, but I never use them in photos or web designs
    …PS does have more tutorials and extensions, but there are still HUNDREDS of each for FW

  • http://www.mercurymedia.com.au David

    I have been using Fireworks, Gimp and Photoshop for over 10 years now and I would consider myself to be an advanced user of Fireworks and Photoshop.

    A lot of the people here complaining about Fireworks are experiencing the same problems I had 7 years ago when I started to move from Gimp to Photoshop, and that is finding changing UI’s to be very confusing.

    A lot of people here have correctly noted that Fireworks is built specifically for designing and exporting graphics for the web.

    But one point that has not been mentioned is the fact that Fireworks is a completely VECTOR based graphic design application, Photoshop is NOT. This makes it much easier to resize and manipulate the images you created without having to worry about losing quality.

    When it comes to creating graphics for the web I have found that Fireworks takes fewer steps to do the same task as in Photoshop and also does that same task more quickly.

    What we really need is a showdown between Photoshop and Fireworks to illustrate just how much quicker it is to do the same task in both applications, e.g. create a logo, rounded rectangles, buttons, icons etc.

    A lot of Photoshop users might be shocked at how much slower Photoshop actually is in comparison to Fireworks with such a test, it will also graphically (pardon the pun) answer the question for them as to why Adobe never dropped Fireworks when they acquired Macromedia.

    The answer is because Fireworks is specifically designed for web designers, while Photoshop is not, and the more you use both products, the more this begins to show.

  • http://www.mercurymedia.com.au David

    I just saw Andre’s link to his blog post comparing Fireworks to Photoshop, I would recommend that everybody read it as it perfectly illustrates why Photoshop is inferior for web design when compared to Fireworks.

    http://www.reinegger.net/50_reasons_not_to_use_photoshp_for_webdesign.html

    I hope the staff at WebDesignTuts ask him for permission to use his article because what Andre’s blog post does is illustrate very clearly why Fireworks is better for web design.

    I know WebDesignTuts already has a similar article but unfortunately it was written by someone who has no knowledge of Fireworks and this unfortunately really shows.

  • newbie

    And what path should newbie take? Photoshop or Fireworks? :)

    • http://themeforest.net/user/epicera/portfolio?ref=epicera Brandon Jones
      Author

      Both! Fireworks is probably the best starting out point, but I think every designer should know Photoshop for advanced image editing techniques :)

      • newbie

        Thanks for your answer…currently i am trying to figure out designing in photoshop, because i found a lot of tutorials for it, but i haven’t found a lot for fireworks.. it is interesting that lot of people suggest using fireworks while there aren’t so many tutorials out there on the web..

  • Eduardo

    Hi people,

    Iam from Brazil and i’m sorry for my bad english.

    I always used both softwares…
    Photoshop to increase effects and filters to my vectors and fireworks to create the full layout and slice.

  • Carlos Cessa

    Hi there,

    I’m a web developer from Mexico and have been working in web design for a couple of years now

    I start in fireworks for the design phase of any site and later i was drag to the photoshop enviroment, mostly ’cause it seems to be by far the choice of exellence between web designers, so at the time i do my designs in photoshop but i use fireworks for the slicing part, it just seems to me that the photoshop slicing tools are not as great as those of fireworks

    What do you think??

  • Laura

    Photoshop is my choice for web design. When I was in school I was misguided by my teacher (whom I know realize was awesome with graphics, not so good with web design or development) to use Illustrator to build websites.

    Photoshop is the way to go in web design creation.

  • Pete

    The main issue here is “CHANGE” people don’t like to change even if the “grass is greener on the other side”.

    Most FW users I know used to use PS exclusively UNTIL someone peaked their interest in FW. (trying it on a project or 2)

    Now, I find that most PS users, NEVER used FW previously as they’re primary tool of choice or even enough to warrant the “I don’t like the workflow” or “I don’t see a use for it” comments. In fact I was one of those PS users, until a buddy of mine showed me how I could do almost everything I did in PS saving so much time. Not to mention, the vector/bitmap capabilities in FW is basically like having PS and illy in one.

    everything is basically non-destructable in FW, which is a dream.

    Client: hey you know that blur you added to the cropped photo
    PS User: yes! ?
    Client: Can you make it a little less blurred ?
    PS User: @#$@#%#^!!!!!

    FW User: “Click, done!”

    I’m sure by now you know which I’d vote for. I do use PS, but only for its strengths (complex photo manipulation, brushes) other then that, I don’t have time to waste!

    FW FTW!!!

  • Sara

    FW for sure. I use both but much prefer FW for web design layouts (and use it 100% of the time for that) and also prelim layouts and “sketches” for some logos and print work where later I switch to Illustrator or Photoshop or both.

    I was learning web design and all the Adobe and Macromedia programs when Fireworks first came out. It was greatly anticipated. The whole concept was that it was object oriented (so you could easily manipulate and assign changeable properties to all the objects) and combined vectors and bitmap images in one tool.

    That is what it is and that is what it does. I do my work so much faster in FW than when I have to do layouts in Photoshop (for print work). I do use Photoshop (the king) all the time for any heavy duty image manipulation I need to do. But for layouts I find it an almost impossible tool. The layers are so difficult to manage and text is difficult to work with and the work process is so slow it is sometimes excruciating. It seems convoluted to work on the layouts without the object orientation.

    I think that in some ways it is a beta versus VHS sort of deal (as far as web design and layout concept goes). When graphic designers used to print work started getting into web design, more and more features were added to Photoshop to support it. No one wanted to try FW. But it works so much easier.

    When Adobe took over Macromedia, I was afraid we would lose FW and its unique platform. I was afraid since so many use PS, it would start to drift away. I am so glad it is still here and I hope they keep improving it. I wish I could use it for print layout work as well, if only it supported cmyk and large resolutions better.

    I enjoy using InDesign as well. I know there are a lot of features in all the programs that I don’t even tap into tho. Too busy working and not enough time to learn everything!

  • Dustin

    Website built 99% using Fireworks:

    http://www.komodomedia.com/

  • bikeman

    I’ve always used Fireworks and never found it lacking. The prohibitive price prevents me using Photoshop for my web design work when FW does 95% os what I need. For the remaining 5% (photo manipulation) I use the more reasonably priced Photoshop Elements.

  • Paul G

    Fireworks CS5 £285 + Photoshop Elements £57 = Total £342

    vs

    Photoshop CS5 £660

    nuff said – why pay for the overkill of Photoshop if you don’t need it. Most web design doesn’t require PS.

  • Dustin

    Having researched this subject for a number of years now, the more I find out the more I truly believe (at current) Photoshop to be far superior for web design.

    Have been reading Smashing Mag’s “Mastering Photoshop for Web Design” and their points are very valid. Only on page 20 of the first book and am already convinced.

    One quote from the book is even in favor of PS over AI or vector-based images on the web:

    “Because Photoshop documents are based on a pixel grid, the path tools make them superior to Illustrator for designing on-screen media.”

    For some reason there are FW gurus out there who seem to think PS doesn’t have the pixel point accuracy and a snap to pixels feature. Veerle Pieters made a blog post on how to optimize PS for your web design workflow, and explains how to do this:

    http://veerle.duoh.com/design/article/tips_on_how_to_optimize_your_web_design_workflow

    So while Fireworks may have some great ability as far as pages, states, and so forth, it’s clear the program still has a long ways to go before established designers will consider it as their only program for web design. Nevertheless, I appreciate the effort and energy that seems to be bringing Fireworks to the next level.

  • http://studiomagnolia.com Cesare

    I am much more comfortable with Fireworks. For one thing it is lighter and produces smaller files. Probably it does less, or it has less tools. I think that’s what helps me to focus on what matters. If you like this philosophy and you are on a Mac you should also check out [Acorn] (flyingmeat.com/acorn/)

  • http://dribbble.com/Isabel_Aracama Isabel

    Fireworks is not there to be compared or to be put “against” Photoshop…

    They are different and they are intended to do different things.

    Photoshop “supporters” should understand FW is not the little impaired brother… FW is for prototyping, designing apps, icons, and everything screen in a way PS was never prepared for

    FIREWORKS IS VECTOR BASED GUYS!! Photoshop is NOT.

    Fireworks will save you time – it is fast and intuitive to work with, and will enhance your designs for the screen.

  • Hugo

    Excuse my English still is not as good

    I was really surprised as Photoshop is present in the work of many designers and I’m surrounded by them. Photoshop was designed for digital retouching, photo-and photo editing all the infinite possibilities that we can have special tools and sorprendenetes. If we watch carefully all options are exclusive to photoshop photo editing, and yet it happens that these tools are those that were taken and used to the web site design (rather than for what it was designed) but oh! ! surprise we now have a worldwide trend to use photoshop and its highest virtues in creating our website with effects and filters, but true as well look good. But make no mistake, they still use a tool for something that was not intended.

    Fireworks was developed as a tool to enable the same time: an intuitive design, agile, with many graphical capabilities (filters, colors, vectors, etc …) and while the content can be managed with great ease (edition typographic, pages, layers, etc,…)

    Use Fireworks as the primary tool and use Photoshop to edit photos, I very much agree with what is said:

    http://www.reinegger.net/50_reasons_not_to_use_photoshop_for_webdesign.html

    and believe me the proper use of both can reach a very smooth workflow even using Illustrator. I have seen many U.S. agencies that use Fireworks to their Workshop to demonstrate efficacy, the same Adobe can attest to its power.

    Some designs made ​​in Fireworks http://tomanguilla.deviantart.com/gallery/

    Greetings to all

  • m

    Reasons for using FIREWORKS and not PHOTOSHOP when creating on-screen graphics:

    FILTERS
    PS: Adding a blur to a shape, you have to rasterize it.
    FW: You can add any filter to any object

    PS: Suddenly you can’t use a certain filter for a certain layer. There are no explanations on why this is the case and you can’t even see the fly-out menu with filters that “used to be there”.
    FW: You can apply anything to anything at any time

    VECTORS
    PS: Shape layers are more confusing than they have to be. You can’t apply effects to vectors in Photoshop.
    FW: You can interact with vectors directly in the artwork, just click on it and you can move it around without having to pay close attention to which layer the object is on.

    OBJECT PROPERTIES
    PS: Rounded rectangles: You can’t change the radius after drawing it. You can’t see the result of the radius until you have drawn it.
    FW: Each object can be reviewed and analyzed quickly by looking at the property inspector when the object is selected. A rectangular shape has a “rounded corner” setting and when changing the value it updates in real time.

    CONTROLLING & SELECTING
    PS: You can select an object from the canvas by holding down ctrl (PC) but after adding a few objects to the artwork you basically have to work from the layers if you don’t want to interact with pop-up dialogues telling you layers are empty or locked etc. You basically have to name every object you create in order to find it again. Selecting something from the canvas when you get a complex document is just impossible. You end up “searching” for your objects for way to long. This makes it trickier to “sketch” or make something quickly in PS. Example: Draw ten lines on top of each other in random directions. Try moving or changing one of the lines without interacting with the layer panel. It’s pretty much impossible without naming every object. The objects you draw are “sinking into the artwork” and the more you create, the harder it will be to get hold of them.
    FW: Every object lights up as soon as you hoover over it, letting you know you can select it by just clicking. If you need to select an object that lies below the highlighted one there is a “select behind” tool

    PIXELS
    PS: Nudging a pixel when zoomed in further than 100% or less than 100% and the object will move in half-pixels (etc). There isn’t even a setting to get the nudging to snap to pixels.
    FW: One nudge click equals one pixel. You can set each object to be anti-aliased or not, there is even a “snap to pixel” fuction for objects that might be off-pixel, real simple (when using sub selection tool you can move anchor points to half-pixels)

    LOCKING
    PS: Even if a layer is locked you can accidentally select that layer.
    FW: A locked layer is locked and you will not be bothered by it.

    TRANSFORMATIONS
    PS: When a transform is ongoing, or a text field is being altered, you can do nothing except work with the transformation. You can’t close a document, you can’t “unselect” by clicking on the outside, in other words you are locked until you press enter (or ctrl-enter when working with text). Because of this you have to let go of the mouse/pen and interrupt your workflow.
    FW: You hold down ctrl and press outside of the object and you are ready to interact with other objects. A very quick way to work.

    HIDING
    PS: When you press ctrl-H it means you want to hide all the stuff around an object but when you do that for a text you still have the “transformation box” around the string.
    FW: Ctrl-H hides everything and you can see the artwork clearly.

    MULTIPLE OBJECTS
    PS: If you want to apply a layer blend mode for more than one object you have to do it one object at a time. When selecting two at the same time, PS “forgets” what modes they have. Even if they have the same mode.
    FW: You can select multiple objects on multiple layers and create the same blend modes for them. You can add the same effects to them etc. Even if they have different properties before.

    COLORS
    PS: When selecting a color for an object or a shape you might want to select other colors than the ones in the artwork, say for instance the color of a shape in the layer panel. You can’t.
    FW: You can sample colors from anywhere on the screen, even from the FW GUI if you would like to.

    GRADIENTS
    PS: Handling gradients is cumbersome.
    FW: Every vector object can be set to have “Gradient fill” instead of “Solid fill” in the property inspector. The gradient is then controlled from either the property inspector or the actual object. Like in Illustrator but in a more straight forward way.

    These are just a few of the benefits…

    • http://www.snaptin.com Ian Yates

      I’d appreciate a little more detail in the future :P Thanks for your input!

  • #fragment-slidertop-1 Nicky Tennies

    I almost never leave a response, but i did a few searching and wound up here Photoshop vs Fireworks: Which One Do You Use for Web Design? | Webdesigntuts+. And I actually do have some questions for you if you tend not to mind. Could it be simply me or does it give the impression like a few of the responses appear like they are left by brain dead visitors? :-P And, if you are writing at additional online sites, I’d like to keep up with anything new you have to post. Could you make a list of every one of your community pages like your linkedin profile, Facebook page or twitter feed?

  • http://dribbble.com/Isabel_Aracama Isabel

    Anyone who really learns and understands what FW is, wouldnt ever use PS or even AI for screen design. It’s like saying you prefer a rolling pin over a hammer to nail. As simple as that. But then again, one has to know what FW is all about. Btw, check my vector illustrations with FW… you’ll like them, I’m sure. Much much faster workflow than Ps or AI and just as good (or in my case.. much better hehe). Cheers.