More new version requests: Original ideas

[MarkMyWords]

Thanks for those keys Jon, I just tried them out, excellent!

Don't ask me why I didn't try using the delete key before - it seems obvious now, but - I never claimed to be smart! That will save me burning up a few brain cells everytime I do line work.

[MarcT]

I use the colour editor a lot and a quicker way to toggle between editing line or fill colour would be great. Is it possible to have the eye dropper and 'no-colour' checkbox follow the left and right click convention for fill or line colour editing?

Great idea! maybe right-clicking a color in the color editor could behave the same way as the bottom swatches.

press "b" to break the line at the node point.
Jon

I did not know about this one, thanks!

[Ned Addie]

One thing I haven't seen mentioned, and that I'd find especially useful, would be a more streamlined way to use node-reduction smoothing... When drawing with the freehand tool, I find the best line quality (subtle changes preserved with fewest nodes) is achieved through a low percentage setting for freehand smoothing, followed by node-reduction (shape-editor) smoothing. (Increasing the initial smoothing for fewer nodes, doesn't preserve the line character as well)... In most cases, I smooth all nodes, and smooth them at 100%. It would be great to simply select an object -- without switching from the freehand tool -- then click a toolbar button or hotkey to have the whole object smoothed at 100% (preferably implemented so the percentage could be optionally backed off with the mouse wheel while the object was still selected)... Of course, if there was a way to get the same line quality with a preset, without needing to use both smoothing sliders, that would be ideal... In any event, I think smoothing an object 100% with a single click would be useful for many people. Currently it's relatively labor-intensive.

An addition to the toolset I would find valuable is an 'anti-smoother' -- a slider to incrementally add jaggedness to a line or outline. It would complement feathering and noise as ways to remedy the sometimes stark look of vectors.

And how about a toggle button to automatically deselect newly created objects? A 21st century alternative to gluing one finger to the escape key...

--Ned

[MarcT]

Another feature I was thinking about (although I'm pretty sure this must have been previously suggested) is a stroke shape/pressure profile editor

It could be a window with a mirrored path that would define the pattern.

[gbredon]

You can dra n' drop images out of the Clipart Galery. It would be great if you could rag n' drop into a gallery as well. I requested this last time this thread was open but to no avail.

[steve.ledger]

You can dra n' drop images out of the Clipart Galery. It would be great if you could rag n' drop into a gallery as well. I requested this last time this thread was open but to no avail.

Have you found it useful to simply add a new folder of custom graphics to the clipart gallery?

Click -> Disc Clipart ->Browse to folder -> Click 'Add' Allow Xara to create index. Done

[gbredon]

How would you save a part of an open drawing in the clipart gallery for use at another time? Before I moved over to Xara I used a program called Professional Draw. It allowed me to drag a whole drawing or any highlighted part of one into a gallery and immediately prompted me for a name for it. I found this a very convenient and quick way of keeping commonly used drwings or elements of drawings in one place.

[steve.ledger]

How would you save a part of an open drawing in the clipart gallery for use at another time?

Export the selection (ctrl+shift+E) to PNG,TIFF or BMP and save it to a folder that you can add to Xaras clipart gallery as previously explained.

[gbredon]

But I want to drag 'n drop them in vector (.XAR) format.

Thanks for the responses.

[steve.ledger]

You can export the selection as a .xar file (or any supported file type) and follow the previously mentioned steps.