Yes, true. For some it works, for others it does not, or is half-broken. There is no true replacement for FIreworks. Just like there is no replacement for After Effects, or for Flash. Fireworks is very specific in what it does right. I have replaced it with a bunch of applications. And obviously those applications are much more feature-rich in some areas, and less in others. I would have to add, though, that Fireworks is starting to show its age in many areas. Let's hope someone will take note, and come up with a modernized updated alternative. ... View more

No worries, my favourite platform is actually STILL the Commodore Amiga and its AmigaOS/Workbench environment! Ah, those were the days! I also run a Mac in a virtual machine, and teach on Macs and Windows machines. I am platform-agnostic. I was merely hinting at the Mac platform's switch to Intel CPUs from PowerPC CPUs, which does hinder running older software on the newer MacOSX versions. Freehand being one example. ... View more

I agree: age of an application does not matter, as long as it serves the job. Windows users are somewhat luckier in that compatibility with older software is generally better compared to Macs. ... View more

Andreas, as D Fosse stated, newer software obviously has more breathing room to cater to these issues. Affinity Photo was recently introduced on the market, and its developers are acutely aware of the challenges posed by retina screens for screen designers. And they built a solution into Affinity straight from the bat. Photoshop, however, has a legacy code base which is over two decades old. It is going to be more problematic to rewrite core parts of Photoshop's code to accommodate a good solution. I doubt it is even possible at this point, or worth the effort. ... View more

No, Fireworks renders its vector shapes to the native pixel resolution of the document, just like Photoshop. There is no way to turn that behaviour off either. In Photoline vectors, text, and high resolution bitmap assets can be either visually rendered to the native document pixel resolution, or to the screens resolution. A simple keyboard flick "Ctrl-1", and presto. Therein lies the rub, my friend. It is the main reason why Photoshop will never be great for this type of screen design work, and why we are discussing the half-hearted work-arounds in this thread in the first place. Fireworks had (has?) a number of features which are still sorely missing in Photoshop. ... View more

...which is why I use Photoline: basically exactly what you are describing. And as for a huge overhead: Photoline's installation file is a mere 20~30mb(!) depending on Windows or Mac. True page support and basic DTP features are also quite helpful. It is neither a new application, and has been around since 1995. Granted, no animation, video, or 3d fluff in Photoline - I use dedicated (far more powerful) applications for those anyway. D Fosse wrote: So, vector data completely divorced from raster data, and the two living separate lives in one file. In other words, Photoshop and Illustrator rolled into one. Yes, I suppose that's possible. But is there any point? Let's be realistic here. The overhead would be huge, for very marginal benefit. For a new application designed from the ground up this could be a way to go. But again, this is a time window we're talking about - in five years or so high resolution displays will probably have taken over completely, and the whole point is moot once again. ... View more

I have to correct you there, because it is only a half-truth: applications such as browsers render the fonts and vector images at the highest pixel resolution possible on a retina/4K screen. Photoshop is unable to emulate this behaviour, and zooming in 200% causes the pixels to be doubled for both vector graphics and text. In Photoline and Illustrator, for example, the pixel grid can be turned off, which renders bitmaps as bitmaps (pixels), and vector art and text are rendered at the native screen resolution, even at 200% zoom - which is the "correct" behaviour. The situation is exacerbated by the limitations of smart objects: even IF a 2X resolution version is nested in a SO, it is still rendered visually at the lower resolution of the master document. Photoshop's preview on a retina screen does not reflect the actual rendering of such an image in a browser. In applications such as Photoline, InDesign, and Illustrator this is a non-issue: the designer works at the "interpreted" lower resolution (for example, 1024px width), and the high resolution image content is displayed nicely at true resolution on a retina screen. Not so, unfortunately, in Photoshop. Thus the only solution is to design at double the resolution in Photoshop, which is not exactly ideal either. As a Photoshop user, the front-end designer has two work-arounds available to her/him: 1) work at the original interpreted resolution, zoom in at 200%, but with the caveat that vector, text, and 2x resolution content in SOs is rendered at a twice as low resolution compared to what browsers and apps on retina screens render, or 2) work at double the resolution, zoom out at 50%, which means all measurements must be doubled, and thereby losing the physical dimensions relationship with the platforms one designs for. In the end the proposed 200% work-around in Photoshop is only halfway usable for screen, web, and front-end designers dealing with retina screen design. Arguably I would say Photoshop is rather awkward in the first place for screen-based (GUI) design work, and I would urge anyone still doing this type of work in Photoshop to look for alternatives. Especially now that retina screens have become the norm (well, at least for Mobile). Even Illustrator and InDesign are "better" choices in my opinion - and for many other reasons as well. My advice: do your bitmap prep work in Photoshop, and the GUI/front-end design in other design applications which honour the interpreted resolution and vector/text/2x image rendering. Even apps such as Macaw and PineGrow  are better propositions for web work (Muse might become usable after the devs add responsive layout design) - especially since they render the result directly in a browser-based environment. You truly get what you see in those cases. And having a code base for free is incredibly useful as well. ... View more

Neither are replacements for Fireworks. Muse cannot edit bitmaps, or create vector graphics like Fireworks does. You will still need a bitmap editor and perhaps a vector editor to accomplish that (Photoshop, Illustrator). Comet will be a user interface design and prototyping app: again, for asset generation you would need other applications. I suppose currently Xara Designer Pro comes pretty close on WIndows (if you require it all in one application). For Mac, Sketch seems to be a popular alternative. I prefer Photoline with Inkscape and a smattering of plugins and other small external utilities. ... View more

There is a reason why InDesign is missing from my list: I have not found a good replacement yet for my InDesign CS6. QuarkXPress: been there, done that - I surely do not wish to return to that mess. Scribus is okay, but really pales in comparison to InDesign. Next year the developers behind the Affinity alternatives are releasing an InDesign alternative for Mac. Perhaps that will work out. But fair is fair: InDesign is a tough act to follow for the competition. For now I will stick with my CS6 license. ... View more

One of the most efficient methods to drive away customers is a confusing price/subscription model. I do not think your point system would work that well in practice. The landscape is changing: excellent alternatives are now available for the hobbyist/semi-pro user base. Premiere: BlackMagic DaVinci Resolve (win/mac, free for up to 4k editing) - impressive NLE features were added to this industry standard colour grading software. After Effects: BlackMagic Fusion (win/mac, free for up to 4k editing) - special effects and compositing software, which outperforms AE in many respects. Perhaps not as suitable for motion graphics, but far more advanced for visual effects and compositing work. Combine with Blender (free, mac/win/linux) for 3d work. Photoshop: Photoline (mac/win) and Affinity Photo (mac). Krita for digital painting (win/linux/mac, free) Illustrator: Affinity Designer (mac), Xara Designer Pro (win), CorelDraw (win) Edge Animate: Hype (mac), Google Web Designer (mac/win, free), Scirra Construct (win), NodeFire (win) Flash character animation: Anime Studio (mac/win) Flash interactive app/games: Scirra Construct (win), and many others Dreamweaver: PineGrow (win/mac/linux), various excellent editors (Netbeans, SublimeText, Brackets, and more - most editors are 'better' to code in than DW) All perpetual licenses, and very affordable (except for CorelDraw). As a hobbyist or semi-pro user, there is no need at all to become a digital serf in Adobe's digital Serfdom. ... View more

Try turning off hardware acceleration to check if there is a problem with colour management and the openGL pipeline. If the gradient looks fine without OpenGL, you'll know that there's an issue with openGL. ... View more

It is related to the way Photoshop interpolates between points while drawing. As I have demonstrated before in this thread, zoom out a lot, and draw curvy strokes quickly, either with mouse or pen. Zoom in, and you will find the kinks and jitters. There are quite a number of Photoshop legacy issues which are completely ignored (it seems) by the developers. This is just one of them. The 16bpc mode issues are another one (banding when zooming out, only 15bpc and information is thrown away). A useless 3d rendering engine. And JMack can probably list quite a few as well. For one or more obscure reasons nothing is done to address these - for years and years now. Ah well. ... View more

What image mode are you working in? If 16bpc, there may be no fix. Switch to 8bit per channel or 32bit per channel. or do not zoom out. ... View more