Just Released: Xara Photo & Graphic Designer 11

[katemoir]

Xara Photo & Graphic Designer 11 has just been launched.

As usual you can find an overview on our website @ http://www.xara.com/photo-graphic-designer/whats-new/ and more detailed information in the release notes @ http://xaragroup.magix.net/PGD11releasenotes/ but the highlights are:

• A big step forwards for the Brush Tool, with new Art Brushes and enhanced Scatter Brushes
• New industry standard blend / transparency modes
• Lots of new & improved text features including abbreviation expansion
• Document sync with Dropbox or GDrive
• Significant PDF and Word import improvements
• An extension of the Shape Editor Tool (Liquify Tools).

Gary Priester has done his traditional first look which you can find here http://xaragroup.magix.net/PGD11/

Fyi the Liquify Tools and latest SmartShapes (check out the new spiral) are the first quite simple examples of what can be created with our new plug-in technology, for which we intend to publish an API so that third parties can add features, tools and SmartShapes. The API isn’t ready to be released yet, but if you’re a JavaScript developer and this sounds interesting, send us a ticket via support.xara.com to register your interest and we’ll keep you posted. In the meantime I hope you enjoy the new features, they will of course all be in Pro 11.

[handrawn]

installing as I type

[digitalphaser]

Good job Xara!!!

The most interesting:

Art brushes - Finally. Great!
New Blend Modes - Overlay, Hard and Soft Light are very very useful options!
Liquify Shape Editing Tools - Not sure. But the possibility of expanding (via JavaScript if I understood correctly) sounds intriguing.
Font Replacement - Good!

The rest we'll see. Hopefully a couple of extra pro-goodies will be added to the XDP version

[handrawn]

just to say an issue has occurred:

my wacom will not produce rendered strokes when program set to pressure recording - it does when pressure recording is off
also there is a crash if a custom brush type is selected by the wacom without leaving pressure recording first

this has been reported to xara

[Centaurus]

just to say an issue has occurred:

my wacom will not produce rendered strokes when program set to pressure recording - it does when pressure recording is off
also there is a crash if a custom brush type is selected by the wacom without leaving pressure recording first

this has been reported to xara

Have the very same issue.
That makes me wonder - since this is a critical bug for my work (I constantly use pressured brushes), so it doesn't make any sense for me to continue testing the new version, is there a way to freeze the trial period until the bug is fixed?
To be honest I had to skip a number of version of Xara Designer for the same reason... installed a new version, some critical bugs occurs that prevents from using the software, and than the trial expires before the bug is fixed, and as a result I choose not to risk it and wait until the next version.
Thanks!

[gwpriester]

Have just treated myself to the new version, a birthday present to moi, yippee.

Happy Birthday to Vous.

[Grenou]

Merci beaucoup Emeritus Dude/Sir :-)

Grenou

[handrawn]

Have the very same issue.
That makes me wonder - since this is a critical bug for my work (I constantly use pressured brushes), so it doesn't make any sense for me to continue testing the new version, is there a way to freeze the trial period until the bug is fixed?
To be honest I had to skip a number of version of Xara Designer for the same reason... installed a new version, some critical bugs occurs that prevents from using the software, and than the trial expires before the bug is fixed, and as a result I choose not to risk it and wait until the next version.
Thanks!

have you extended the trial? if not you should be able to leave it until the bug fix is ready and then extend the trial at that point

[KultiVator]

Wahey... new vector tools for 'artistic' strokes and for vector deformation. Can't wait to try this out on a Cintiq when I return from hols.

[handrawn]

ok the new art brushes are seriously cool - more on that later

the liquify shape editing is quick and easy

the 'intersect all shapes' is a sort of 'enhanced slice' and useful

however the new blend/transparency mode/types don't really add anything for me [just 'trying to be photoshop'] and worse, apart from STAINED GLASS, the ones I used most are gone: LIGHTEN, DARKEN, HUE

very quick subtle changes to colouration, whilst maintaining black/white tone highlights was possible with these, can't seem to get it to work the same way at all with the new set, so no reason to upgrade there and it could well be an issue for files where backwards compatibility is not available

some examples:



top left - original
top right - original with pale yellow rectangle and HUE
bottom left - original cloned and DARKEN applied to the clone
bottom right - original cloned and LIGHTEN applied to the clone

EDIT - still get left and right mixed up, now put right... [just as well I can afford to pay someone to drive me around ]