I see that Xara Photo & Graphic Designer 9 is now released, though not the pro version which is a first. I hope the Pro verson will not be too long coming.
Derek
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I see that Xara Photo & Graphic Designer 9 is now released, though not the pro version which is a first. I hope the Pro verson will not be too long coming.
Derek
Thanks Derek, I just spotted it too and Gary has a 'First Look' available http://xaraxone.magix.net/PGD9/
We have just launched Photo & Graphic Designer v9. You can find details on our site @ http://www.xara.com/photo-graphic-designer/whats-new/ but here’s a brief overview.
• Photo healing tool
• Background erase tool
• New Mask & Region tools
• 11 New Photo FX plug-ins
• Bonus photo software (MAGIX Photo Manager & MAGIX Online Photo Album free for one year)
• An easy way to re-color elements in complex grouped objects
• Direct support for Google Fonts & a new Google Font picker
• Support for multi-weight fonts in the font menu
• New Shape Painter tool (the Shape Builder previously seen in Pro X)
• Graphical bullets & numbers
• Various other misc improvements
In addition to the information on our website, you can find detailed info in our release notes @ http://www.xara.com/photo-graphic-designer/notes and of course don’t miss Gary Priester’s First Look on the Xara Xone @ http://xaraxone.magix.net/PGD9/
We’re going to surprise you this year by not releasing Designer Pro X9 at the same time. It’s on the way! Yes, it will have all the new features of Photo & Graphic Designer 9 (and Web Designer 9 Premium).
hi,
since i like to upgrade my pro version as usual when will the pro version be out? can you give us a hint? why later this time? are you coding some last minute vector tools?
bb,
FLy
Nice overview, Gary P!
Mike
It's later because there are some extra Pro-only features that we're still working on, can't say more than that!
The background eraser looks great. Roll on pro.
Yeah, the background erase is so much better than the current feature Color Select/Remove feature.
The new Photo Healing tool is pretty awesome too and the regions - mask tools are really effective.
You can use the new FX filters on vector objects as well as photos.
So, there are some really cool and fun things.
I consolidated Kate's announcement thread with Derek's.
I would be very surprised if there were no new features unique to Designer Pro 9, or I think it is going to be X9.
Some good improvements but I notice that, as with Photo & Graphic Designer 2013, the new version still doesn't support the processing power of multi-core processors.
Advanced features are available in the Pro version only..
To Kate Moir:
Downloaded it, tested it, bought it. Congratulations to all of you for the further development of this fine, fine program.
And my sincere thanks, as a retired person on a budget, for lowering the price. In an age of marketing hype, P&GD 9 is a true bargain.
Jonathon Donahue
Darn I forgot to do a custom install. I noticed that it installed simpicheck as well without asking. I eradicated it. It also put an icon on my desktop without asking, a pet peeve of mine.
Thanks Grace! Just got rid of mine also. Looked it up on Xara Support --
So, well-meaning or not, it's still crapware, installed without notice.Quote:
Simplicheck is a small, intelligent system tool that checks your computer for optimal performance. If it finds problems then it will inform you and direct you to the correct version of Simplitec software to purchase for your system.
You can remove it through the Control Panel and it will not affect anything else.
These things are like stupid junk mail. They actually think I'll BUY a program that was installed on my PC without my knowledge or consent? Come on!
For anyone else who is installing the trial, Do the custom install. You can leave everything set at defaults as you go through the install and you will get a page that will allow you to opt out of Simplicheck.
Just caught up with the 5/21 announcement and the comments above. I've got Pro X -- and have already downloaded the eval of WD9, and now see P&GD9... really would love the v9 of Pro! Of course I'd like to see you guys get it as solid as you can and iron out bugs before release -- but I'm really looking forward to the upcoming release. I've got a great new project that would be perfect for it. Would love to be able to use the full product, rather than piecemeal it with evals of WD9 and P&GD9. Fingers crossed for an imminent release of a fantastic product!
background erase, colour replace, region tools - you done a good job - looking forward to the pro release
So I downloaded the demo. I was looking at the "replace color" in the first look and in the example it says how to change the color of a navigation bar. So I figured I'd use that as a jumping off point...
But I can't find the Create Navigation Bar command anymore - would usually be in the arrange menu but it's not there any more. Not grey - just not there. And there are no demo web templates included in the demo or any navigation bars in the demo designs gallery. Now, I don't really use this feature often, as I usually just use Xara for the graphics part of the sites I build custom templates for in Joomla, but I found it odd that they would've removed this feature.
Am I missing it somewhere? Did they just recraft how it works again?
Thoughts?
Perhaps you are thinking of Web Designer or Designer Pro Scott?
Photo & Graphic Designer is the replacement to the old Xara Xtreme. Geared towards Graphics rather than web.
See the comparison list here
► http://www.xara.com/us/products/designer/compare/
Yeah - maybe so. I've never used P & GD. But I thought each higher version had all the features of the lower version plus some. I guess not!
And so now I feel like I'm losing my mind: I just looked back at the "first look" article and sure enough there's no mention of the navbar color replacement. What the heck was I reading that showed exactly that? Hmmm...ah - it was the Web Desinger 9 first look article. But I guess here's where I mentally merged these - there's some text on the P&GD article talking about the color replacer that says "If you have a Navigation Bar or buttons that you are using for a website, you can edit both the visible MouseOver button as well as colors for the button on the MouseOff layer which is hidden behind the MouseOver button"...you can see how I might have thought those features would be there, right?
Anyway - kind of strange that the export as website options are still in there, as are things like the 955px webpage base template, the mouseover layer, the option for "this document is intended to be a webpage", the "page background" right click menu with things like "tiled", "fixed" and "scrolling" as options, none of which would be useful outside of the context of a website - but they would remove some of the web options from the intermediate application.
I'm also a bit confused as to which things are really new vs. named something different or just added to P & GD where they maybe used to be pro-only features. For example, the "shape painter" tool. In the new version it's called shape painter, in Designer Pro X there was a tool with the same icon called shape builder. I played around with the two and aside from a few gui changes on the top bar (notably a size slider added and the sketch mode removed), I don't see a difference.
I really AM looking forward to the embedded Google Font selector to come to the Pro version, as I like to use things outside of the standard web-safe font list, but it's a pain to deal with downloading all the fonts individually as you must do currently to work with the Google font library and being able to design with a choice of those fonts is much better than having to sift through them all online, removed from the design to try to imagine which variation on a slab-serif font you might want that day! :)
I also look forward to the better background eraser and the seemingly easier/better object removal options that are sure to come in the Pro version as well. I know a lot of these features are there in varying degrees already, but it looks like their interfaces and abilities have been cleaned up a bit. But I do have to say that, which the example removal of an orange background from some blueberries looks impressive, most images the we have to deal with removing backgrounds on are not so color-opposite and harder to get seperation. I'm glad for the removal of the slight white haze, as this constantly plagues me with taking a jpg off a white background, but we'll see how this all works out in the real-world practice, I suppose.
Hi,
I am new to Xara and this web site. Do they offer upgrade pricing? I do not see anything on the web, but I just bought the 2013 version. I am thinking of switching from Corel Draw, which is more than I want to keep paying. So I would like to upgrade, but I do not see an upgrade path on the Xara web Site..
THANKS
Welcome to TalkGraphics FlyRed
CorelDRAW, what's that? (Just kidding).
Have you looked at this page http://www.xara.com/us/photo-graphic-designer/buy/
If anybody knows -- who made the artwork for the P&GD 9 splash screen? It is really good, very professional, and I, for one, would like to congratulate the artist on their design. Way to go!
Very frustrating -- I have 2 days left on the eval of the new Web Designer, and no sign of v9 of Pro-X on the horizon yet. Also frustrating that virtually NONE of the elements such as nav bars are included. I can look at them, but not use them unless I purchase. I don't generally use the prebuilt stuff as a cookbook because I don't like cookbook results, but these have always been a great starting point for me, help tremendously in prototyping, and can then be modified or replaced as I firm up a design.
It's a shame -- I wish Xara / Magix would consider an idea such as:
- let us license these separate packages as they become available
- when Pro-X v9 is released, allow us to "upgrade" to it, crediting us with whatever we paid on WD9 and P&GD9. They could also disable the license for the other two products.
No doubt there are logistics issues involved, in case people pirate copies of the software so it can't be decommissioned. But this shouldn't be any different than normal pirating management processes and procedures.
If Xara would consider doing this, I would sign up immediately for both WD9 and P&GD9, and upgrade to Pro-X the moment v9 was available. Seems like a win-win for everyone -- and Xara would actually benefit by getting more revenue, sooner, and "locking in" more customers earlier in the product release cycle.
If any Xara executives are watching...please consider this!!!
Or you could just resist the temptation of WD and P&GD and wait for the Designer Pro. I know it's hard to ignore all the exciting new stuff but it makes for a less interrupted work flow :D
Well. I bought P&GD, because, for less than US $70, it was irresistible, and, because I'm retired, what's the song? 'Who could ask for anything more?' Something like that.
For you, Jon, it's even simpler. Take P&GD, and assume that the next XDP won't come along for two more months. So then it's like -- 'does P&GD have any new features that will help me earn an extra $35 per month, until July 31?' Same with Web Designer. What do you think?
Thanks Jon -- I was working on a very similar type of rationalization. Also - in today's brief experiments (trying to create my own slide-out vertical menu bar), I'm finding that certain features in WD9 work properly--but actually don't cooperate quite as well in XDP. I'm actually about to post a test file in the other thread where I'm discussing that. The file works properly, and can be previewed (CTRL-F5) properly in WD9, but does NOT work properly in the previewer in XDP8. I also love the idea of using Google Fonts. I know that I can manually download them via Google's own tools, but doing it from within the Xara tools is SO much easier.
To your point: although I can certainly use the last generation of tools, I'd love to jump on the new features -- and I've got a paying project right now where I can apply them.... It's also almost Father's Day...and these might make a lovely present to myself for the occasion... =D>