Broaden Xara X's appeal

[RAMWolff44]

Did you download the beta version of OpenOffice 2.0?? Boy will you be happy!! It's VERY buggy so don't expect allot from it but quick shapes are just out of this world. Gradient fills and all sorts of other goodies. If I am to understand what they mean to do is to offer a filter to save and import WordPerfect files too!! Plus a host of other really neat things. It's still fast but it did crash quite a bit on my XP Pro (SP2) system.

All the best

[Sheff]

Dmitri's Font Seeker program is very handy. Is there a way of incorporating that function into the Font Gallery Window? It would be useful to type a word or phrase and see how it would look in the various fonts.

[qmr]

I use programs other than Xara for these purposes:

1. Edit bitmaps in Photoshop and png them back into xara.
2. Export drawings/designs for further animation in Flash.
3. Drawings requiring pressure-sensitive outlines are done in Freehand or Illustrator.
4. Large images are printed as multipage images on my A4 printer from Coreldraw.
5. Preview font styles for a bit of text as I scroll down the font list in Coreldraw or Freehand.


Critical improvements Id like to see in Xara:

1. A proper pressure-sensitive pen, like the one in Freehand and Illustrator.. ie: it is smooth, and in wireframe view the line has few points and while accurately recording the shape and path of the stroke, it remains a simple shape.

thanks,
Q

[jaxtraw]

I would very much support/second Quentin's request for a proper pressure-sensitive pen.

[blkeeney]

Hi Charles,
I am by no means an artist, but I've been using and loving Xara X for several years now. To see what it is I do with the program, please look here http://www.oliviaandco.com/Belle.html
What I would like to see in the next upgrade is a deform tool, so that I can import a graphic and deform it's shape....give it a curve. Another feature that would be great is a magic wand that you could use to select by color. That way you could import a black and white graphic and color it by selecting various parts and applying a fill.
At this point the only other program that I use regularly is Paint Shop Pro and the only reason is for the deform tool and the magic wand and ability to fill a black and white graphic.
Thanks so much for considering these things. In my mind, these would make Xara X1 absolutely perfect!!!
Belle

[blkeeney]

One more thing I just thought of....

I'd love to see more quick shapes....definitely a heart. I'd also like to see the rulers be able to be turned diagonally.

Thanks so much,
Belle

[AntonM]

Following on from Belle... and a way to define my own quickshapes, and my own line dash patterns and arrowhead shapes, and my own animation sequences in X3D (said in the hope that X3D functionality might become part of XX²?).

[AntonM]

Another thing I don't use Xara for is slides for presentations. I use Powerpoint, and hate it.

I'd much rather use Xara. The fundamentals are there in the form of animated GIFs (but of course you wouldn't use that file format).

All I'd need would be the ability to produce in XX, and then display via a (probably PD?) Xara displayer, a series of .xar files which are in some way related to each other in sequence.

[wW]

Belle, on the guides layer if you want a diagonal line just draw it on the guide layer. It's not a ruler but it is something that you can snap too if you turn your snap to guides on.

In fact you can draw or paste any shape on the guides layer & it will become a guideline.

[rh]

#1
If you want more mainstream appeal, make the Toolbars more easily customizable like you did in Xara 3D

#2
The Navbar tool has to have a feature for slices like Fireworks. I need to be able to rename and set the name of the slices to export the images like I can do in Fireworks.

I think you need more tools to do EFFECTS like Fireworks can have Alienware plug ins.


#3
Look at what make other programs great and do it or at least it one better in Xara X2