Macromedia R.I.P.
With Adobe dumping the Macromedia brand altogether soon, I’m left wondering the future of two of my favorite Macromedia products; Fireworks, and Dreamweaver. Adobe’s already explained they have immediate plans to merge the Flash Player and Adobe Reader (see Designorati for my more complete article about the acquisition) but haven’t formally announced plans to discontinue any products. But based on the two new software bundles, I think I can speculate as to what they’re ditching.
I can understand Adobe not wanting to sell two different version of the same product but I genuinely view Fireworks as a different animal than Illustrator or Freehand. Both of those are desktop publishing tools, but Fireworks was created with the web designer in mind. It doesn’t hog my RAM, and does a job I’d otherwise need both Photoshop and Illustrator to do. Macromedia put a lot of work into the Studio 8 release, with oodles of new blending modes, and the ability to create custom user panels in Flash.
Director’s demise has been evident ever since the delayed release of an MX version. While there’s not as huge a market for Director as Flash, it definitely serves functions Flash is not yet ready to. I think people confuse the two as interchangeable, but Director was never really intended for web. (with the exception being web-based video games, before ActionScript this would’ve been near impossible in Flash) Director’s primary implementation has always been kiosk displays, enhanced cds, and digital brochures. Even though Flash has made leaps and bounds with video and sound, I don’t think it’s ready to fill the shoes of multimedia-catch-all.
Yeah, I’m feeling a chill about this merger also now. I was entirely fine with the idea until yesterday, when I saw the Adobe-fied Macromedia Website. Macromedia still have a youthful freshness to its products, and my impression of Adobe has been that their products have been in maintenance mode for years.
I’m mostly irked by the loss of Freehand, as I’ve never really liked Illustrator. I wonder if anyone will pick it up. While I’m complaining about Adobe I might as well say I wish someone would update DeluxePaint for modern systems…I liked its pixel-level control a lot more than Photoshop’s clumsy implementation.
Hobbling away on my cane, muttering…
Dave
I think the Freehand vs. Illustrator thing is really a matter of personal preference. I always used Freehand in college, but when I started using Fireworks more, oddly Illustrator seemed more compatible.
I’m not familiar with DeluxePaint, but I’d like to see them pick up Painter. (used to be Corel, not sure what it is now) I used it for coloring comics in college and it rocked when combined with Freehand.
Continues walking uphill both ways in the snow…