Fireworks Developer Center

Working with the Adobe Text Engine in Fireworks CS4

Arun Kaza (Oct. 15, 2008)
Leverage the Adobe Text Engine to manipulate text objects and work seamlessly between Fireworks, Photoshop, and Illustrator.

Designing a media player skin in Fireworks

Nikola Borisov (Sept. 29, 2008)
Learn how careful use of the Pen tool, the Combine Paths feature, the Subselection tool, and Live Filters in Fireworks allows you to design creative elements for a custom user interface.

Using Fireworks CS4 for interaction design and rapid prototyping

David Hogue, director of information design and usability at Fluid, shows in these videos how Fireworks plays an indispensable role in the information and interaction design process:

• Using Fireworks for information and interaction design
• Creating interactive prototypes with Fireworks
• Rapid prototyping with Fireworks
• Fireworks as part of the complete design process

Top 10 features of Fireworks CS4 from an application designer's perspective

Michael Tuminello (Oct. 15, 2008)
Get a designer's take on the top new features of Fireworks CS4 and learn how a few changes to your setup can improve the tool's efficiency even further.

Introducing Adobe Fireworks CS4

Rick Jones (Oct. 15, 2008)
Learn about the notable new features and improvements in the tenth anniversary release of Fireworks.

Designing interactive products with Fireworks

Get a perspective from Nick Myers at Cooper, one of the industry's premier design firms, on how you can use Fireworks to drive the design of interactive products.

Fireworks in enterprise IT

Nathan Smith (Mar. 10, 2008)
Find out why Fireworks is an excellent tool for designers and developers working in a collaborative enterprise environment.

Creating an icon in Fireworks

Vane Kosturanov & Vanco Stojkov (Feb. 19, 2008)
See how easy it is to create an icon in Fireworks and lend some professionalism to your website.

Designing a media player skin in Fireworks

Nikola Borisov
Learn how careful use of the Pen tool, the Combine Paths feature, the Subselection tool, and Live Filters in Fireworks allows you to design creative elements for a custom user interface.

Creating Web 2.0 elements in Fireworks

M. Hammad Bhatti
Create glossy buttons in Fireworks using simple layered effects.

Pen and gradient tools showcase

Rodger Fuller
This website concept design highlights Fireworks features such as the vector pen, filters, layer effects, masking, and powerful bitmap handling.

RokWebify

Andy Miller
Use this design to modify Joomla! CMS templates, or as a starting point for creating more advanced website layouts.

Website Layout and Logos

Ryan Smith
These samples show a simple website mockup and clean, attractive vector logos created only with Fireworks CS3.

XD Brownbag Poster

Ryan Hicks
XD Brownbag Poster shows the usefulness of the gradient opacity controls in Fireworks CS3 and the Ellipse gradient's multi-handle directional controls. Use them to draw in a way that mimics the real behavior of light.

EffectiveUI Development Workflow

Lance Christmann
The illustrations in this sample show how capable Fireworks CS3 is at creating 3D-like illustrations with 2D tools. Each illustration in this sample was created entirely in Fireworks CS3, using almost all vector objects, and is on a different frame of the source file.

Pixel Building

Trevor McCauley
Pixel Building is an example of "pixel art" in Fireworks CS3 where elements are created on a pixel level and sport a pixelated look.

Bullet

José Angel Rivera Domínguez
Bullet demonstrates the effective use of bitmap manipulation in Fireworks CS3 in combination with vectors.

• bullet_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 1.22 MB)

Reflect Ball

José Angel Rivera Domínguez
Reflect Ball is comprised of editable vector objects that can easily be moved around or flattened into a bitmap for more custom effects using the bitmap tools in Fireworks CS3.

• reflect_ball_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 240K)

Recolor

Angelo Sabal
Recolor is a complex design pushing the limits of Fireworks CS3 using both bitmap and vector tools.

• recolor_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 6.2 MB)

Blueprint Logos

Angelo Sabal
Blueprint Logos contains a large collection of logotypes created in Fireworks CS3 that you can deconstruct to understand how they were developed.

• blueprint_logos_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 4.5 MB)

Create Slideshow source files

Alan Musselman
Access the Create Slideshow source files to customize the look and feel of the out-of-the-box slideshow players. (Requires Flash CS3 Professional.)

• create_slideshow_players.zip (ZIP, 2.5 MB)

Color Palette panel

Viktor Goltvyanitsa
Define color values, blend colors in new ways, and swap color schemes using the improved features of this updated command panel in Fireworks CS3.

Guides panel

Eugene M. Jude
Use this tool when designing and aligning multiple objects on the canvas to produce a pixel-perfect layout.

Gradient panel

Grant Hinkson
Use this tool to edit complex gradients with a level of precision previously not available in Fireworks.

Fireworks to XAML panel

Grant Hinkson
Migrate your existing Fireworks artwork to your Windows Presentation Foundation projects using this command panel.

Super Guides 1.0

Steven Grosvenor
Create isometric illustrations of any size, angle, and opacity. Included is a user guide (PDF) to get you started.

• super_guides_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 420K)

Exporting legacy Fireworks libraries to the Common Library

Import symbol libraries from Fireworks 8 or earlier editions and convert them to work in the Fireworks CS3 Common Library.

Exploring the Demo Current Document command in Fireworks CS3

Quickly export your mockups and wireframes into a slick slideshow geared for giving presentations to clients or colleagues.

Using the 3D Rotate command in Fireworks CS3

Create graphics with 3D perspective using this new command built with the powerful JavaScript API included in Fireworks CS3.

Creating a professional-looking slideshow

Use the new Create Slideshow panel in Fireworks CS3 to build a slick slideshow in three quick steps.

Fireworks commands by John Dunning
Check out these commands from John Dunning, some of which have been updated to accommodate the new sub-layer and page features of Fireworks CS3, and others of which are new.

Old Paper

José Angel Rivera Domínguez
Quickly apply high-quality paper styles that include Live Filters with custom textures to simulate old paper effects.

• old_paper_styles_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 212K)

Creative

Apply these styles to objects for instant cool effects, and easily change the colors, Live Filters, and textures in the styles to match your layout.

• creative_styles_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 212K)

PaperGrams

Danielle Beaumont
PaperGrams are hand-drawn flow diagram and wireframe elements, created in the spirit of pencil and paper. As rich symbols in the Common Library of Fireworks CS3, they can be intelligently scaled with symbol properties for background color and font.

• papergrams_fw_cs3.zip (ZIP, 2.9 MB)

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Fireworks Exchange

Browse and download extensions for Fireworks, or create and post your own.

Fireworks LiveDocs

Access Fireworks documentation and add your own comments to it.

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