Re: FLASH: Undecided newbie Flash 4 designer

[John Dowdell]

Pretty much what the other folks said, but with different phrasing:


FreeHand is the general design tool, and your creative work here can go out

to *several* formats: direct to SWF, to printers, to other applications,

read/write PDF, export as HTML, more. The longer your design stays in

FreeHand, the more flexibility you have in where it ends up.


Fireworks is dedicated to fast workflow for web graphics. The output is

usually GIF/JPEG. It creates great PNG for Flash textures, but it's more a

specialized delivery editor than a general design tool, like FreeHand.


Illustrator can also be used, but its scope is much smaller than

FreeHand's... you'd need InDesign and Streamline added to Illustrator to

match the range of general design tasks that can be handled by FreeHand.


Summary: Need complex curves? Use FreeHand. Need rich textures? Use Fireworks.


(Tip: Flash's own drawing tools are very powerful... if you're coming from

a Bezier-style background then you may not see this immediately, but people

who have spent time in Flash can quickly create amazing shapes in Flash

alone. There's no *necessity* for using a PostScript drawing tool... it's

more a convenience for those who already know that one technology.)


jd







John Dowdell, Macromedia Tech Support, San Francisco CA US

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