Comments on: Drawing Conclusions

By: The Complete Overview of Indie Graphics Software for Mac | Design City

Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:17:17 +0000

[...] “A new vector drawing program with a fluid, graceful interface, great brushes and a host of other features.” ZeusDraw’s interface is the least traditionally Mac-like of the Mac-native applications in this list, but at least one very thoughtful user has come to the conclusion that that’s actually for the best. [...]

By: The Complete Overview of Indie Graphics Software for Mac | Mac.AppStorm

The Complete Overview of Indie Graphics Software for Mac | Mac.AppStorm — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:03:06 +0000

By: Skylamar

Skylamar — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 08:47:55 +0000

Hi. I own Lineform and Intaglio and I just tried out VectorDesigner and ZeusDraw. The reason I keep using Lineform is that it has an ‘artistic strokes’ feature that makes strokes look like they are hand drawn. Otherwise I wouldn’t use Lineform, because I find that it’s too buggy. I keep using Intaglio too because one of its Core Image effects is 3D lighting which is great for making text and objects have some depth. I haven’t seen that 3D lighting effect in the other three programs. I love that it’s very simply to add and subtract nodes in Vector Designer. I think I liked Vector Designer’s interface the best overall. But I agree that the bezier tool in ZeusDraw is the best. Too bad, I can’t combine the best features of all these programs.

By: Vic

Vic — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 00:40:44 +0000

Thanks for this great in depth review. I have read many comparison reports on these programs today and this is by far the most convincing.

By: Laying It All Out | Jettison Canopy

Laying It All Out | Jettison Canopy — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 03:54:21 +0000

[...] to Photoshop such as Pixelmator, Acorn and (at the time) DrawIt; and we’ve had a good overview of drawing tool options with a huge head-to-head of Intaglio, Lineform, VectorDesigner, and ZeusDraw. Now it’s time to [...]

By: Sajid Nawaz Khan

Sajid Nawaz Khan — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 03:11:36 +0000

Thanks for the thorough review. I managed to get a great deal on VectorDesigner via MacHeist. I find VD incredibly easy to use and is UI is very intuitive. There are a couple of minor bugs, but the developers are very friendly and responsive.

By: Marty

Marty — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 14:23:16 +0000

Somehow the ranking of these in the final thoughts surprised me. From the individual tests I got the impression that Intaglio performed rather well, whereas ZeusDraw showed “promise” but also shortcomings. At least some of the earlier comments appear to agree with this view.

I wonder if owning Illustrator can bias a review of these competitors. One might prefer ZeusDraw in this case as it extends the Illustrator feature set with some new stuff, and the others don’t and only compete on existing features?

After trying out the apps myself (and confirming selected tests in the article) I decided to go for Intaglio. In my opinion it is the most mature of the reviewed products both in terms of legacy and version number, has a broad feature set and variety of import/export formats.

One thing worth mentioning is that Illustrator allegedly does not use the Quartz 2D graphics subsystem – in contrast with all the reviewed products. This could be important if you are looking for pure Mac OS X integration.

Anyway I second most of the feedback: this is a great review and incredibly helpful. A big thanks to Jon for writing it all down – and just at a time when I was looking around for a vector drawing app (having only recently come from Windows/Xara).

By: Your Host

Your Host — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 06:38:41 +0000

@flo: You might be right. I see the commercial Windows version of Xara has been updated, but it looks like the Linux Version has stalled sometime around Fall of last year. November 2007 was the last build they listed. The source files and compile instructions for Mac OS X are available still, but until development picks up and Mac Developers in particular get interested in working with this code, progress doesn’t seem soon, if at all.

Xara, by the tone of their posts and community seem(ed) (s) to want to get a good build together of their ‘ware and then work with Inkscape to capitalize on features on both sides.

Doesn’t seem to be happening although I haven’t kept tabs on this at all.

Inkscape has huge mindshare in the Linux Community. Xara has been around a long time, but measured strictly by number of users and popular recognition, remains small even compared to CorelDraw. The mindshare thing is a real problem for developers competing in this sector, and problems are compounded by developers having to choose what project will get their time and attention. So even if there are real dedicated fans, if they don’t code, not much can happen.

Have you tried building Xara on Mac OS X yet? Is it okay? Bad? Indifferent? I may try it on my Parallels install just to see. I like the look of the active tools and no dialog box approach.

http://www.xaraxtreme.org/developers/documentation/mac_xcode_project_build_instructions.html

By: flo

flo — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 20:30:57 +0000

xara xtreme got open source and they aim to make it native on os x. :) might get good then.

By: Jon Wipple’s Drawing Conclusions

Jon Wipple’s Drawing Conclusions — Wed, 28 May 2008 22:08:17 +0000

[...] Jon Wipple has just recently written a very detailed analysis of different vector art software products (Intaglio, Lineform, VectorDesigner, and ZeusDraw). This article goes into depth and compares everything from Memory and Performance to Preferences to the different Toolsets. Its a great article that I recommend you take a look at. [...]