Software Vault: The Sapphire Collection/Software Vault (Sapphire Collection) (Digital Impact).ISO/cdr16/cyberr02.zip/FREEH

Text File | 1994-10-18 | 8KB | 139 lines

                         Aldus FreeHand 4.0
                             review by
                             Judy Litt

    If you hang out on the boards (CompuServe, America Online, the
Internet, FidoNet) and you use a PC, sooner or later you're going to
notice it: there's a lot of Corel bashing going on.  I use Corel,
and I like it.  I also use FreeHand and Illustrator.  So it was very
interesting to me when I got the chance to review FreeHand 4.0 for
CyberNews.
    One of the first things you'll notice when you open FreeHand 4
is that there's no dialog box to open a new document.  You'll have
to go to the View|Tools menu and start opening some palettes.  The
first one to open is the Inspector palette-this is where you set the
parameters for your document.
    This brings me back to Corel.  Corel, graphic artists will tell
you, is for non-artists.  FreeHand and Illustrator, on the other
hand, are for real graphic artists.  All the palettes in FreeHand 4
are very reminiscent of Corel.  You don't have to wade through lots
of dialog boxes to get something done.  However, all the palettes
can really clutter up the screen.  FreeHand should take a tip from
Corel: there should be a way to minimize all open palettes with one
click of the mouse.
    Another new feature that I'd been eagerly awaiting is the
support of multiple pages.  FreeHand implements this in a way
similar to Illustrator: there is a pasteboard on which a maximum of
thirty letter sized pages can fit.  The really cool thing is that
you can have multiple pages of different sizes on the pasteboard.
Rearranging pages is a snap.  You simply display the document
inspector, and drag the pages until they're in the positions you
want.  When you drag a page to an empty space in the document inspec
tor, the other pages automatically re-number.
    Moving between pages takes a little getting used to.  You must
first highlight the page you want to go to on the document
inspector, and then go to the lower left corner of the window.
Press where you see a percent, and then choose fit page.  There are
two buttons on the lower left side of the window that are welcome
additions to FreeHand.  One displays the current view magnification,
and allows you to change that magnification to fit page, fit all,
12, 25, 50, 100, 200, 400, or 800% with the click of a butto n. The
other allows you to toggle back and forth between preview and
keyline mode.
    Creating and applying colors is a breeze and the way it's done
is truly unique.  There are three palettes involved: the color list,
the color mixer, and the tints palette.  To create a new color,
click on the color model you wish to use in the color mixer (CYMK,
RGB, and HLS).  Then move the sliders until you have the color you
want.  Drag that color to the color list-and it's automatically
added.  You must then double click on the color name to rename it
(don't forget to press enter).  If you want to create tin ts of a
color, drag the color to the tints palette.  The palette will
automatically show you tints in ten percent increments from ten to
ninety percent.  Then just drag the tint you want back to the color
list.
    Applying colors is drag and drop also.  Just drag a color to the
object you want to color; it doesn't matter whether or not the
object is selected.  You can also apply color the old fashioned way.
Select the object, select either fill or stroke on the color list,
and then click on the name of the color you want to apply.  A word
of caution: if you place a color graphic of any sort into FreeHand,
the colors applied to that graphic are automatically added to the
color lists.  Even if you later delete the graphic , the added
colors remain.
    If you create custom colors that you know you'll be using again,
never fear.  You can export colors into your own personal color
library.  Or you can make up several personal, customized color
libraries.
    The way text is handled in FreeHand 4 is quite different from
previous versions-with many useful new features.  When you click the
text tool on the page, you immediately get a text box that you type
into.  At the top of that text box is a ruler with tab settings.
You'll find setting tabs easy if you're already using PageMaker,
since both programs use the same sort of system.  You can also click
and drag to create a text box of the size you want.  When you first
start creating text boxes, you'll notice that the y're opaque-you
cannot see anything behind them.  If you want them to be transparent
(I did), go to preferences on the file menu.  Put a check mark in
the box "buffered drawing" under the display menu.
    If you don't click and drag to create the correct size text box,
you may find yourself working with text boxes that are much larger
than the actual type.  Doubleclick on the link box, and text box
will resize to fit the type.  Many new operations on type are useful
and easy: tabs, space before and after paragraphs, columns, rows,
hyphenation, text wrap, flowing text into graphics; the list goes on
and on.  I did find a few of these new operations awkward - kerning
type, in particular.  To kern type, you click an insertion point
between two letters, and then specify an em space percentage to
increase or decrease the space between those two letters.  FreeHand
4 is getting awfully close to marrying the illustration and page
layout program, but it's not quite there yet.  There are no master
pages and no spell checker.  The only type of text that can be
placed is RTF or ASCII.  You can have text wraps, but not on groups,
blends, or OLE objects.  If you want to wrap text around an OLE
object (say a CorelDRAW graphic), you must create a path around the
OLE object and then wrap the text around that path.
    Another long awaited addition to FreeHand - support for OLE.
Finally, FreeHand and PageMaker talk to each other.  Well, sort of.
You can't place a FreeHand graphic into PageMaker, but you can use
the insert object option under the edit menu to get your FreeHand
drawings into PageMaker.  You can now place CorelDRAW 3 graphics
into FreeHand, but not any later versions of CorelDRAW.  This is
good news if you own CorelDRAW 3, since there is plenty of clipart
with that program, and there is no clipart bundled with FreeHand.
Other graphics formats that can be placed: cgm, eps, ai, drw, tif,
bmp, wmf and wpg.
    One feature not implemented well in any version of FreeHand is
autotrace.  You have almost no control over it.  I think FreeHand
has a poor autotrace program compared to Illustrator and CorelDRAW.
    Although many operations that were buried deep in the menus are
now on palettes, there are some new operations that are now buried;
most notably all the new path operations.  But it's worth digging to
get at these.  FreeHand 3.1 had a wonderful manual, and a good
on-line tutorial.  I don't like the way the manual is organized in
FreeHand 4, and there is no online tutorial.  There is a small
getting started tutorial, which is good, but if you're not familiar
with the program it'll probably take a while to learn .  It's not
the same old Freehand.  This version of FreeHand is almost a whole
new program.  There're new tools, a whole new interface, new
operations, and some operations have changed places on the menu.
Even exiting the program is different.  If you haven't saved
recently, the program will inform you of that and ask whether you
want to quit or review.  Many of the changes in the program are
exciting.  If you're upgrading, it's definitely worth the price.  if
you're trying to decide on an illustration program, Fre eHand should
give Illustrator a run for the money.  But users new to illustration
programs, and FreeHand in particular, may find it a little hard to
learn.

Requirements:   486 or higher
                MS-DOS 5.0 or higher
                MS Windows 3.1 or higher
                12 MB RAM
                20 MB hard drive space

                         Aldus Corporation
                       411 First Avenue South
                       Seattle, WA 98104-2871
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