After various random rounds on Twitter lamenting the demise of Macromedia Freehand, cartoon-style illustrator Garth Bruner decided to do something about it. He’s started posting an ongoing series of YouTube video screencasts demonstrating key differences between Freehand and Adobe Illustrator. He highlights how he created vector art in Freehand, then jumps over to Illustrator to attempt the same task, comparing tools, techniques and workflow.
Bruner is admittedly an Illustrator newbie. As with other Freehand users who were forced to migrate to Illustrator after Adobe’s acquisition of Macromedia (and subsequent retiring of Freehand), Bruner feels as if he’s taken a major productivity kick in the pants. But he’s also open to the idea that perhaps he’s just not aware of the best way to accomplish certain tasks in Illustrator, and therefore the videos are also presented as a kind of open dialog for himself and other Freehanders who need some help making the switch.I have been following these Illustrator gripes on Twitter with much geek interest, as I had never used Freehand and wondered what the fuss was all about. I also thought it a great way to find new features to bug Adobe for on their feedback/bug report/feature request form. Illustrator Von “Vonster” Glitschka seems to have taken the attitude that Adobe will not heed these requests, but I am hopeful. I may be a bit spoiled from having access to shareware developers over the years, where often you’ll see feature requests implemented the next week, or even the next day.
Already some of Bruner’s videos have brought up some workflow issues he was having due to lack of knowledge of Illustrator, but also he’s shown many cool features and tools previously available to Freehand users that I would like to see implemented in Illustrator CS4.
A must-see for any Freehand user migrating to Illustrator, but also interesting for those Illustrator vector artists out there to see how the other half has been working all these years. If you see a feature or tool you like, be sure to head over to the Adobe software feature request page and ask for it. Only features requested via this form are considered, and project managers on the Adobe forums have repeatedly said these submissions are taken seriously.
Shortly I will be posting in regards to what seems to be the major Freehand user requests, including Vonster’s Illustrator main feature/tool gripe/wish list. If we all ask for the same features and tools, they have to get noticed.
by George Coghill -
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Tags: Adobe, Adobe Illustrator, art, artist, cartoon, FreeHand, illustrator, Mac, productivity, screen capture, software, technique, vector, video
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