What Xara Design Pro 11 is lacking - suggestions for next version

[pauland]

I'd like to see the Flash component developed just a bit more.

Everybody is moving away from Flash, so I wouldn't see Flash as a priority - quite the opposite.

[Gare]

I'm happy to be wrong about this, but doesn't Xara also export to AVI?

If so, the next big thing is alpha channel support. Boris makes a ton of money from After Effects plug-ins that just animate text. If Xara redworks the keyframe part of its animation engine, I think you have an inexpensive replacement for a lot of text fx engines.

It might be good for Magix to start supporting alpha channels, too. PIP doesn't cut it in 2015 (or in 1998!); make your film editors deal with alphas for compositing work.

-g

[Luke.Hart]

Xtreme will export alpha channel, just select uncompressed and then 'Make background transparent' in the export options dialog.

[Gare]

I moved the Forms discussion to

here

[Gare]

Xtreme will export alpha channel, just select uncompressed and then 'Make background transparent' in the export options dialog.

Thanks for the info, Luke. Seriously, at some point, Magix might want to consider supporting in their video products an alpha channel. It would be at least a first step in rudimentary integration between products.

And I know of no video editor in the pro-sumer arena (under $200) that can recognize alpha info in an AVI uncompressed video. I don't think even the great and mighty Apply Final Cut can.

It's a selling point, for sure.

Thanks!

Gary

[xtom]

+1 for the ability to create forms. Like drag and drop text fields with design freedom to position and resize them on the page, add background images etc. and the ability to name the form and fields for server side processing, maybe support for multi-page or multi-stage forms too.

[bwood]

But Paul, perhaps I'm talking about slide shows etc. Isn't that a flash component?

[pauland]

But Paul, perhaps I'm talking about slide shows etc. Isn't that a flash component?

You don't need flash for that these days.