Xara3D features

TRADITIONAL 3D programs are notoriously difficult to use and understand. Not so Xara3D. Unlike much modern 'bloatware' that offer more features than are ever likely to be used, and take an age to learn and understand, Xara3D has been created to perform one job, and performs that job with style, speed, and slick simplicity. Xara3D is solely designed to create the highest quality 3D titles and logos for use on Web pages. All images are fully anti-aliased for that smooth professional quality. Xara3D can also create vector or raster based Flash files, animated screensavers and cursors, as well as high quality animated GIFs or AVI movie sequences in seconds.

 

Creating and Importing

  • Uses any TrueType font. Six fonts are included in the download and a further 50 on the CD. Simply select the font from the drop down menu and type away
  • Supports international character sets, such as Japanese, Chinese and Russian
  • Full text control, including alignment, sub- & superscript, line spacing, tracking and kerning values for individual characters or over whole selections
    Instant access to full character sets from within the text dialog
  • Can import 2D graphic shapes as Windows metafiles (WMF and EMF) and Webster files (XAR and WEB) to be used as outlines
  • You can select any background color and texture to match your web page background. Then you can position your image exactly against the background
  • Full anti-aliasing for the best possible on-screen display.


Xara3D screenshot

Editing and Applying Special Effects

  • Interactive control over the 3D extrude depth
  • Copy any attribute (or several) from one existing file to another via the Style Picker
  • Unlimited undo
  • Automatic button-making tool which converts any heading into a button
  • Real-time 3D positioning around three axes by simply dragging the image on screen
  • Real-time solid shading with optional error-diffusion dithering for top quality results
  • Areas of text can be selected, and different attributes such as bevel, color, fonts and text settings applied
  • A total of 25 different bevel types with adjustable bevel size
  • Simple to alter lighting (three adjustable light arrows for interactive adjustment of the color and direction)
  • Flexible interactive controls over the color and texture of the image and background
  • Images can be displayed with front and back faces, or can be made hollow
  • Images can have bitmap textures applied per character
  • A total of 37 textures are included in the download, and there are 800+ on the CD-ROM you receive when you purchase
  • You can also import your own GIF or PNG files
  • Textures can be scaled, rotated and colored
  • Images can be matt or shiny
  • Images can have a soft-edged shadow and an intuitive interface allows you to simply alter the blur, transparency and color

Animation

  • Images can be animated in many different ways , such as Rotate, Fade, Pulsate, Step, Fade and Swing, using a simple user interface (see screenshot) or the Animation Picker
  • Step-through multi-page animations of different images as well as animations per character
  • The number of frames in a sequence, the rotation direction, the speed, pause and number of loops can all be selected through simple controls
  • Copy the animation attributes from one file to another via the Animation Picker
  • GIF Animations can be paused (and pauses can be seen in the on-screen preview)
  • Great for creating animated buttons.

Exporting your results

  • Outputs Flash vector and raster, JPEG, progressive JPEG, GIF, BMP, PNG (including full PNG alpha channel), animated GIF, AVI, .scr (screensaver), and .ico (icons)
  • Optional background transparency
  • Color reduction and palette-optimization for maximum quality with the smallest file size
  • Complete control over the image size, including a handy Fit To Width feature (with pixel size shown on screen).