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Macromedia FreeHand
This formidable competitor to Adobe Illustrator is forging its own artistic direction.
Product: FreeHand 10
From: Macromedia www.macromedia.com
For: Windows 9x/Me/NT/2000; PowerMac with Mac OS X, System 8.6 or later
Price: About C$550; Upgrades US$199.
Pros: New Master Page feature, free-form contour gradient fill, editable symbol library. Provides the ability to select print areas from large projects, reusable brush stroke tools.
Cons: Crashes when attempting to open some .AI or PDF files created in Adobe Illustrator 9. Can't open PostScript or EPS graphics as vector objects – a feat possible in both Adobe Illustrator and CorelDraw.
Strongest Competitors: Adobe Illustrator 9.0, CorelDraw 10.
Macromedia has announced an updated version of a long-time favourite of many Windows- and Mac-based graphic designers. FreeHand 10's new user interface includes some common Macromedia Flash features, providing the ability to add basic interactivity for Flash content and the ability to navigate and play back Macromedia Flash animations from within FreeHand.
Print designers won't feel left out either, with a new Master Page feature designed to improve the ability to rapidly create pages that share common design elements and -- finally -- the ability to embed fonts in EPS graphics. It's still weaker than offerings from Adobe or Corel when it comes to interpreting PostScript, however.
There's also a new capability to select areas to be printed from larger projects and several new creative tools, including a free-form contour gradient fill function that allows FreeHand 10 users to add drop shadows, bevelled edges, and highlights on objects in an intuitive, natural way, as well as reusable brush stroke tools.
In previous FreeHand releases, clicking on an outline while holding the Ctrl key (Option on Mac) key allowed the direct selection and manipulation of points on the curve. This Direct Select mode, while convenient for experts who knew about the Ctrl key, was never as obvious or accessible as the equivalent in Illustrator, which provides a "hollow arrow" tool dedicated to this purpose. FreeHand 10, while continuing to support the older "Ctrl-click” selection method, now adds a Direct Select tool to the toolbox, making this capability easier to access.
There are several features in FreeHand that are not new, yet remain significantly better than comparable functions in the latest version of Adobe Illustrator. One of our favourites is the ability to easily create text that wraps along the top and the bottom of a circle, as you might want to do when creating a CD label, badge or button design. In Freehand, this is as simple as typing the words and separating them with a carriage return, creating a circle or other shape, selecting both items and then selecting “Attach to Path.” The corresponding procedure in Illustrator is so insanely complicated, it’s not worth mentioning here.
Another long-time FreeHand strength has been its gradient blends, and version 10 carries on this tradition, with gradient blends that automatically adapt to the contours of any filled path (even outline text) you create. Illustrator and Corel both use a more complicated method that divides the shape into a sub-mesh, which you must then fill, piece by piece.
Thus, FreeHand continues to be an attractive alternative to Adobe's market-leading Illustrator and Corel's venerable CorelDRAW for professional illustration. Unfortunately, for those working extensively with PostScript or EPS files, FreeHand's weak import of PostScript artwork -- most seriously, its propensity to crash when confronted with an Illustrator 9 file -- makes it a poor choice compared to its rivals, both of which excel at handling PostScript and EPS files in their native forms. Fortunately, FreeHand’s support of PDF (version 4) files and Illustrator 7.0 and earlier files is good. We were able to open PDF 4 documents created in Illustrator 8 and work with the objects as fully editable vectors.
Overall, we’d rate FreeHand as the easiest of the Big Three vector graphics illustration programs – and often the fastest to use in a production environment, thanks to its better selection tools and simple interface. CorelDraw is the most full-featured, yet Illustrator is the most complex to master.
A 30-day free trial version of FreeHand 10 for Windows PCs or PowerPC Macs is available from Macromedia.com. The page also details the many import and export file formats supported by the program and outlines its system requirements.
For more information on the powerful new features in FreeHand 10, go to http://www.macromedia.com/software/freehand/productinfo/newfeatures/
Flash Friendly FreeHand
A growing number of Web designers are using Macromedia Flash to produce online animations and artwork, and for good reason. Flash files are vector graphics, meaning that you can zoom in on them without seeing jaggy edges. And, because the files aren't bitmap-based, they load quickly and animate smoothly. The trouble is, Flash's drawing and editing tools are terrible. Enter FreeHand. Originally designed as a PostScript illustration program targeting print designers, recent versions have expanded the program's feature set to address many of the needs of online designers and version 10 is the richest yet in this regard. It greatly improves upon Flash's built-in drawing tools. As Deke McLelland notes in a recent Macworld review, "FreeHand… does something Flash doesn't – it makes the process of generating Flash objects familiar and intelligible." While that's not saying much for Flash, it's a fair statement.
The Flash 4 FreeHand 10 Studio sells for C$795.
Product: FreeHand 9
From: Macromedia www.macromedia.com
For: PowerMac with System 8.1 or later / Windows 9x/NT/2000
Price: $399; Flash 4 FreeHand 9 Studio, $499.
Pros: New Symbols library, improved multi-page PDF support. Greatly improves upon Flash's built-in drawing tools. Exports object layers as Flash animations.
Cons: Palette-heavy user interface. Perspective Grid functions awkwardly implemented.
Strongest Competitors: Adobe Illustrator 9.0, CorelDraw.
A growing number of Web designers are using Macromedia Flash to produce online animations and artwork, and for good reason. Flash files are vector graphics, meaning that you can zoom in on them without seeing jaggy edges. And, because the files aren't bitmap-based, they load quickly and animate smoothly. The trouble is, Flash's drawing and editing tools are terrible. Enter FreeHand. Originally designed as a PostScript illustration program targeting print designers, recent versions have expanded the program's feature set to address many of the needs of online designers and version 9 is the richest yet in this regard. As Deke McLelland notes in a recent Macworld review, "FreeHand 9 does something Flash doesn't – it makes the process of generating Flash objects familiar and intelligible." While that's not saying much for Flash, it's a fair statement.
A 30-day free trial version of FreeHand 9 is available from Macromedia.com. The page also details the many import and export file formats supported by the program and outlines its system requirements.
For Further Reading
FreeHand 10:
- Macworld UK: FreeHand 10.
- Creative Mac: FreeHand 10 for Mac, Mac OS X and Windows; special pricing on Flash Freehand Studio.
FreeHand 9:
- Macworld: FreeHand 9: Illustration Program Fantastic At Flash, Fizzles On Features
- MacAddict: FreeHand 9 review
Illustrator:
- Mac Buyer's Guide: Adobe Illustrator 9.0 - review
- The Techno Zone: Adobe Illustrator - Intro
- The Techno Zone: Techniques
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