AI/EPS Import

[philhendry]

Hi Guys,

After several years using, and loving, CorelXara 1.5, I have finally been dragged into the C21st- I've bought Xara X. Wow! I've been reading this forum, and it seems helpful and friendly, which is great.

Most of my colleagues use Illustrator, which I loathe (fat and slow!). However, occasionally, I need to import pictures they've drawn. In CorelXara 1.5, we found that importing Illustrator 5 format worked okay.

I've been finding with Xara X though, that it always seems to find errors in the files, whichever version one 'saves as' from Illustrator. Good ideas anyone?

Thanks,
Phil

[url=http://www.lancs.ac.uk/users/spc/staff/pch.htm]Phil Hendry's page[/URL

[philhendry]

Hi Guys,

After several years using, and loving, CorelXara 1.5, I have finally been dragged into the C21st- I've bought Xara X. Wow! I've been reading this forum, and it seems helpful and friendly, which is great.

Most of my colleagues use Illustrator, which I loathe (fat and slow!). However, occasionally, I need to import pictures they've drawn. In CorelXara 1.5, we found that importing Illustrator 5 format worked okay.

I've been finding with Xara X though, that it always seems to find errors in the files, whichever version one 'saves as' from Illustrator. Good ideas anyone?

Thanks,
Phil

[url=http://www.lancs.ac.uk/users/spc/staff/pch.htm]Phil Hendry's page[/URL

[standay]

Phil,

First, I usually export from AI as an AI file, not an EPS. However, you could try both and see if there is any difference.

On import to Xara, after you get the error message, does the file still import? If so, don't worry about it. However, ff they are *not* importing, try a version 3 export from AI.

If that doesn't work, try this. In AI, open the file you are after, COPY the needed elements, then PASTE them into a NEW AI document. Then export. I know this sounds odd, but this will sometimes work when there are non-visible, extraneous elements in the original drawing.

Hope one of these will help.

Stan

[Mark Goodall]

Phil

If you email the files to us we will have a look and see what the problem is.

Mark Goodall
Xara Ltd

[philhendry]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the replies and the help. By playing around a bit more I have found that I can open *some* AI/EPS files, produced by *some* of my colleagues, but not others- I've emailed a (bad) example to Mark.

I just wish they'd 'see the light' and buy Xara! Trouble is, the prof who does most of the drawings round here has been using Illustrator since about the year dot, and can't see that anything else might be able to perform better. :-(

Perhaps once I get 'up to speed' and he sees things I can do easily in Xara X that he can't do at all, or struggles to match, in Illustrator, he'll change his mind. If he does, then the rest of the flock will follow and Xara Ltd will get a bucketload of orders from here. Here's hoping! [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif[/img]

Cheers, and thanks again,
Phil

[Erik Heyninck]

Phil, just imagine that most printers come from the lead age. Every single font was made in little leaden blocks. (I still use them). Then came the offset press attack, and afterwards the digital era. It frightened them. Things had hardly changed from the 16th C technique. Computers were a big, slow menace and not handy, AND required a lot of study. Then came Steve Jobbs with his Apple idea, and this was a real revelation as it was made for these people from the lead era. At least you saw what you were doing. Next came Photoshop, and because of its quality, they followed Adobe to AI, which is their own free choice. Their eyes will see that Xara can do lots of things better and faster, but there is some kind of blackout further on, because "one never knows" and "why change and have to re-think?".
Printers are very conservative and have a strong group-mind, because they are really very uncertain about their own knowledge. That's why they often boast about things they don't really know. Because printing is a technical study, and computer is for those (sorry) nerdish university dr. Strangeloves. Of course there are exceptions, and things will change, but there is some religious fanaticism in their anxious clinging to something that does the job, and that everybody knows and uses. So: be kind to their ignorance, and work for the future.

Still: I love my old Heidelberg typo press, the smell of ink and oil, the puffing noise etc. Sentimentality? Probably. So what? [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_cool.gif[/img]

[mike engles]

Hello

Have you tried renaming the .ai to .eps and then trying CorelDraw4, Freehand 3 or Artworks eps import.

This works for me importing Photoshop clipping paths. Some of these are unselected and have to be stroked. I once had someone send me a genuine Ilustrator 9 file. It was just a stroked circle.
Xarax would not open it.


Mike Engles

[stewart33]

Hi

I'm having big problems importing Adobe Illustrator files. This seems to happen everything I get a new client and is very irritating
indeed. [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_mad.gif[/img] [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_mad.gif[/img]

Is there some pluggin to facilite AI importing?

Alec

[gwpriester]

Phil,

As one who writes about Illustrator and other vector drawing applications, I happen to know that Xara can run, and draw circles around Illustrator, which has to be one feature-challenged application (although the most recent version shows some promise

Show this professor dude some interactive transparency and ask him how he does it in Illustrator. His only anwere, if he knows his stuff, is to create a black and white mask and then apply transparency to it. There is no way to create a gradient fill on a bitmap.

The image on my Profile is a good example of Xara creating a circular transparency. I placed a photo of clouds over my photo, applied a circular transparency, reversed the transparency settings, and in seconds, placed my head in the clouds.

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

Be It Rarely So Humble...

[Mark Goodall]

Alec

Xara X is best at handling Ai files in version 7 form. So if you can get files in that format you should. There are suitable options in AI.

Mark Goodall
Xara Ltd