Macromedia Fireworks MX

This latest version of the Web-graphics creation tool from Macromedia let’s you add basic JavaScript interactivity to your images. Macromedia has standardized its interface across the MX range of products, and Fireworks is no different. This helps improve the learning curve for all products and enhances the workflow between them.

Coming to enhancements, Fireworks MX has a new sensitive property panel that changes according to the tool selected. This way, you don’t have to keep manually switching between panels to get the work done. A couple of new tools like blur and sharpen have been added to the interface, along with a new select menu. Another feature is the pop-up menu creator, which lets you create horizontal and vertical pop-up menus with just a few mouse clicks.

Switching between vector and bitmap editing modes is also made transparent to the user. Fireworks also provides various import/export options. You can edit your Photoshop files in Fireworks and then save them back to the Adobe Photoshop format. A quick export option lets you export in various formats like Flash, Freehand and Director. This option is further customizable.

The software is good if you use it in conjunction with other Macromedia MX software like Dreamweaver, since they can talk to each other making it easy to use. 

But, as a standalone product, we would rather stick to Adobe Photoshop since it provides more options as far as graphics work is concerned. Plus, if I need to move to the Web, Imageready, which is being bundled with Photoshop, is more than a handy tool for the job.

Geetaj Channana