Archive for the ‘Fireworks’ Category
This effect is easy to recreate and results in a sophisticated looking graphic. It works best with slim, square sans serif fonts, like Ray Larabie’s Neuropol, against a medium to dark background color….
In the wonderful world of web design, there are two main graphic camps – Fireworks users and Photoshop users. This article isn’t so much about the different camps – there are tons of articles out there on that topic – but more so on the reality that sometimes – maybe even often – a designer either has to work with both applications, or at least has to prep artwork to go from Fireworks to Photoshop.
Yes, this is the part of the true, heart-wrenching and inspiring tale of Fireworks conversion. It’s happening, but slowly, one designer at a time . . ….
A couple years ago I created my first Twitter home page background image using Fireworks as my design tool. The goal was to use the background image as a branding tool by supplying a mini-bio on the Twitter page, in what looked like a little content pod. The background of the background image was one of my photos from up north, faded into the web page background color. And it was fine at the time.
Some time ago, Twitter revamped its site, leaving less of the background image visible on the average monitor. In fact, on my 15 inch Macbook Pro, the actual Twitter content was overlapping my old mini bio. Not good visually, or for branding.
So, knowing I had to do something, I decided to create an entirely new background page using more of my photos ? a collage effect ? that would be more interesting, and would still be appealing on larger/higher resolution monitors.
And of course, I planned to do the majority of the work in Fireworks. 
Follow along in this tutorial as I show you, step by step, how I built my new Twitter background page, using not one – but three – Creative Suite applications….
In this tutorial we’ll tackle one of the other cool symbols – the button symbol.
A button symbol can hold up to four different states to represent typical button interactivity: Up, Over, Down and Over While Down. These states are all contained within the symbol itself, so you don’t normally see the extra states in the main page design.
Button symbols can be used for linking as well as visual interactivity and can be a real time-saver when creating a prototype.
In this tutorial you’ll learn about the benefits of button symbols, how to create and edit one from scratch, as well as gain skills in a variety of other areas such as:
Approximate download size: 32MB
The Fireworks Symbols Series:
Fireworks Symbols and Why They Are So @$#$!! Cool – Part 1
Fireworks Symbols and Why They Are So @$#$!! Cool – Part 2
Fireworks Symbols and Why They Are So @$#$!! Cool – Part 3
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In the first segment of this series, I talked about what Fireworks symbols are and how they can speed up your workflow.
In this segment, we’ll build on the slideshow mock up to add a second page (detail page) and create interactivity for move between the two pages. While building the second page, we’ll also create two more symbols, one of which we will nest into the third symbol. Sound completely @$#$!! cool? I thought so, too! Let’s get started.
The Fireworks Symbols Series:
Fireworks Symbols and Why They Are So @$#$!! Cool – Part 1
Fireworks Symbols and Why They Are So @$#$!! Cool – Part 2
Fireworks Symbols and Why They Are So @$#$!! Cool – Part 3…
Fireworks CS5 has improved some of the existing export work flows, compared to prior versions. While these may seem small items, you may find this information quite helpful when you plan to export your graphics….
