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Simple requests, but may be not so simple to actually implement ??
1. Import/Export Illustrator CS2, inc filter effects support
2. Mantain document size when exporting to .AI. No matter what size you set up your page in Xara when you export to .ai the document size is lost and it opens with the default .ai page size and the artwork is placed at the bottom of the page.
Thats all...over and out..
You will never be able to have bevel, shadow, some transparencies, some colour fills and blends. Its just the same when you Export from AI you will never be able to import any of the 3D effects, blends, some of the brushes that are used and various other effects.
Many programmes have different ways of handling transparencies Xara's is one of the best and with AI having there way of using trans. there is no way in the world that you can ask a filter to recognise all the different aspects of the drawing programme. Things will be better when Pro comes out in january with an import of PDF but many of the effects that you are talking about will be rendered as a bitmap on the page and will not be able to be edited. All you have to do is to look how InDesign handles transparencies and when converting to PDF it renders the trans as a bitmap and you have to design your artwork so that you have the type (fonts) to the top and that is between the same company with smart objects.
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A good haircut is well-designed.
Try exporting from Pro in PDF. PDF is Illustrator'd native file format and more of the Xara effects will come over.
As to the size, Xara is a Windows application and displays at 96dpi. Illustrator begain life as a Macintosh application and as will all Adobe applications, it uses the Mac screen resolution of 72dpi.
There is a way to scale your document in the Utilities > Page Options > Scaling tabbed section. The attached may not be correct (I'm guessing) but it is the right idea. If Egg checks in he knows the correct units.
Gary
Or try exporting from XtremePro in the Photoshop .psd format.
Illustrator should be able to open that without a hitch.
- AF
Fair comment about the compatibiity of Xara filters with Adobe and visa versa. I think this is amore of an issue for those that use programmes that are not the industry standard. Where you can share your .ai artwork with the millions of other illustrator users and your local printer (same with Freehand), because Xara users dont have that luxury we need to export to .ai so we can share files with non Xara users and of course your printer who in my case has never even heard of Xara, so the support of filters becomes an issue.
The page size issue though would be nice to see a fix for this, as it's not the scaling thats the problem but the fact that your page/document size is not exported too. For example if we design set up our page size to business card size 88x55mm for example. This page size is not maintained in the export, only the artwork is exported, the page size is not..you have to manually change the page size back to 88x55 when opened in illustrator.
It's only a minor frustration, but still it is frustrating.
So, why don't you export as PDF, instead of .AI?