Freehand Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
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[Freehand] - Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Do any of you use Freehand? Do you know where I can find a forum for questions about Freehand? I am completely lost on how to even start creating designs!
What is your opinion about Freehand vs. Photoshop, Coreldraw, etc?
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
I posted the following and now not sure about the status of Freehand. I thought Freehand was being phased out but now I am not sure. I do know that Adobe did buy them...take the following as general discussion of the programs you mentioned. Google 'freehand forums' and you will get several links to explore
Freehand is going...or has gone away... I think!. Adobe bought Macromedia, the company that made Freehand. this was in April (I think) 2005 and last I heard Freehand was being discontinued in favor of Illustrator. I did not find Freehand on the Adobe site. Freehand, Illustrator and Corel X3 are vector based drawing programs and Photoshop is an image manipulator (and a very good one) of photos which are raster images such as bitmap, jpg, tiff, eps...etc I have both Illustrator (a part of Adobe CS2) and Corel X3. Because I have used X3 longer, and it includes photo program, I tend to use X3 more. Not that Illustrator is not a super program, I just found the learning curve a bit higher and the price a bit higher. I know that you can get free trial of X3 from corel site...I think you can get free trial from Adobe for illustrator.
Just remember that X3 and Illustrator fill basically the same need. Photoshop or other photo programs are for different need. I you are serious in the business, I think that you will end up with both types of programs.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
thanks for clarifying Rodney. Last I heard Adobe was not going to do further development. but that was shortly after acquisition of Macromedia by Adobe. Good to know that long users will still have support and upgrades. Like you I know some folks...especially in the Mac world that swear by Freehand.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Thanks guys. That helps. Now, I just need to learn how to use it...lol. I will check the adobe site like you mentioned and see if I can find more info there. I have also seen conversations on here about separating colors in these programs. Does that mean if I make a design and it has 3 colors, before I can have a custom heat transfer made I have to submit each color separately and they put it together for the transfer? I am sure these are questions I will find answers to later, but I am trying to understand what everyone is talking about. Thanks again!
I have also seen conversations on here about separating colors in these programs.Does that mean if I make a design and it has 3 colors, before I can have a custom heat transfer made I have to submit each color separately and they put it together for the transfer
No, if you are submitting your designs for custom heat transfers (plastisol transfers), you just need to send the company your regular vector artwork file from freehand and they will handle any color separations necessary.
A lot of the plastisol transfer companies seem to prefer coreldraw files, but I think you can export to a coreldraw formatted file from freehand.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
I like Freehand the most over Illy. It has some nice features Illy doesnt, such as better gradient options (they are more handy in FH),multiple pages in the same document, the way the bleeding area is controlled, better tracing options among others. The problem is that Illustrator is the industry standard (at least here) and some problems may ocurr while switching from one to another, specially from Fh to Illy.
Do a google search and write freehand mx forums and check there. I have found forums about every imaginable thing (even t-shirts ) so there might be a FH forum.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
I use both Illustrator and Freehand. I love Freehand for screen printing. The only draw back of Freehand is that it can't arch text that well......if it can I don't know how. If I have to arch text I do it in Illustrator and import it into Freehand. For doing other design work other than screen printing Illustrator is better I think.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Quote:
Originally Posted by stid49
I use both Illustrator and Freehand. I love Freehand for screen printing. The only draw back of Freehand is that it can't arch text that well......if it can I don't know how. If I have to arch text I do it in Illustrator and import it into Freehand. For doing other design work other than screen printing Illustrator is better I think.
About vectorizing in FH I like it because when you add a point and then you are going to place the second point, you can see how the line in between looks, what angle it will have and so. Does Illy haave that feature?
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Titere Wear
About vectorizing in FH I like it because when you add a point and then you are going to place the second point, you can see how the line in between looks, what angle it will have and so. Does Illy haave that feature?
Yeah when you are drawing from point to point drawing both programs are about the same.....they both will show you what it is going to look like. I am a long time user of freehand and started using Illustrator 4-5 years ago. I perferred to draw and do about everthing in Illustrator but shirt design. The 2 main features I love in freehand vs Illustrator are the find and replace color feature and having the option to have mulitiple pages. Sometime I will do most of the drawing and layout work in Illustrator and drop it in freehand.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Quote:
Originally Posted by stid49
Yeah when you are drawing from point to point drawing both programs are about the same.....they both will show you what it is going to look like. I am a long time user of freehand and started using Illustrator 4-5 years ago. I perferred to draw and do about everthing in Illustrator but shirt design. The 2 main features I love in freehand vs Illustrator are the find and replace color feature and having the option to have mulitiple pages. Sometime I will do most of the drawing and layout work in Illustrator and drop it in freehand.
Do you have some advice on how I can start with FH? I have toyed with it a few times, but get so frustrated because I have no idea what I am doing. I have been trying to work with a font that has a tail (like you see on baseball fonts) and I try to pull it this way and that way, but it just ends up all distorted and then I quit. I keep thinking that if I can't do that, how will I ever do designs.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Quote:
Originally Posted by SportsZoneSS
Do you have some advice on how I can start with FH? I have toyed with it a few times, but get so frustrated because I have no idea what I am doing. I have been trying to work with a font that has a tail (like you see on baseball fonts) and I try to pull it this way and that way, but it just ends up all distorted and then I quit. I keep thinking that if I can't do that, how will I ever do designs.
practice everyday.....it will get frustrating. The pen tool takes lots of practice. im not sure if you are using a PC or Mac but on the mac make sure you use the "option" key to help direct where your next curve/point is going to go. it might be a different key on a PC. It would also me helpful to pull in a tif or jpg of something that you could practice tracing around. When I trained people in the past that always seemed to help them start to understand how the pen tool works.
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Quote:
Originally Posted by SportsZoneSS
Do you have some advice on how I can start with FH? I have toyed with it a few times, but get so frustrated because I have no idea what I am doing. I have been trying to work with a font that has a tail (like you see on baseball fonts) and I try to pull it this way and that way, but it just ends up all distorted and then I quit. I keep thinking that if I can't do that, how will I ever do designs.
I would recommend you to get a book. There are book courses for as little as $20.00 and they are quite good for amateurs. I had one called Frehand MX quick tips and it was realy really good!
Re: Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare?
Quote:
Originally Posted by stid49
The only draw back of Freehand is that it can't arch text that well......if it can I don't know how.
Actually that was my frustration for a long time until I figured out how to use the envelope tool. It is an excellent tool and gives you great control of arching text as well as other text designs. FreeHand hasn't been updated or developed for 4 years now and I believe the envelope tool was going to only be made easier to use. The easiest way I found out to use it is to draw a shape that you want your text to be and copy it.
Then convert your text to paths and then paste the envelope to the text using the envelope tool. That's it!
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Does anyone use Freehand? How does it compare? 
) so there might be a FH forum.
