Double Outlines With Contour

CorelDRAW only allows a single outline to be applied to an object. Yet there is a way to get more than one outline quite easily using the contour effect. Let's say that you want a double outline on some text with the middle of the two outlines being white. Basically you want a gap between the text and the outline. Apply a two-step contour to the outside of the object. Select Arrange  | Break Apart (Ctrl + K) so separate the contour group from the original object. Ctrl + click on the inside object in the contour and change its color to white. Then Ctrl + click on the outside object and change it to the outline color you want. Voila, you're done!

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Get Good Artwork

OK, this tip just seems so obvious to me. I hear from users all the time who are disappointed by tracing software. The problem isn't the software, it is that you are getting lousy artwork. When you put garbage in, you get garbage out. Somehow you need to get the message across to your clients that you need better artwork if you are expected to get a good trace. If they want to give you garbage, charge them more! If you keep waiting for the tracing software to improve, you'll never be satisfied.

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Importing AI, EPS and PDF with CorelDRAW X5

I feel that one of the biggest reasons to upgrade to each new version of CorelDRAW is to get the latest and greatest import and export filters. Today I'm going to focus on three import formats that users feel are extremely important and talk about some of the changes that have been made in CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5.

AI Files: CorelDRAW X4 could import files from Adobe Illustrator CS3 and earlier. But it could not open files that were saved with compression. Unfortunately the compression is turned on by default in Illustrator so files had to be opened and resaved in Illustrator before they could be used in CorelDRAW. CorelDRAW X5 can import files from Adobe Illustrator CS4 (the most recent version) and earlier. More importantly, it can work with compressed files. This means you have a much better chance of being able to import Illustrator files than you did in the past. Just keep in mind that files with more complex types of objects and fills are less likely to be fully editable when imported.

EPS Files: CorelDRAW X4 could import EPS files saved in PostScript Level 1 or 2 format. But it couldn't work with files saved with PostScript Level 3 data. CorelDRAW X5 has included support for the Ghostscript engine which allows it to successfully import EPS files with PostScript Level 3 data.

PDF Files: CorelDRAW X4 could import unprotected PDF files saved through Acrobat 8. CorelDRAW X5 can import files saved in Acrobat 9 format (again the most current version).

Given the importance of all three of these formats, you should find that CorelDRAW X5 has made dramatic improvements when importing. Want to give it a try for yourself? Download the trial version and import a few files to see how it works for you. If you are ready to buy, remember you can use the coupon code UNLEASHEDFEB to save 10% if you buy before the end of February. Yes, that code is perfectly valid. If you copy and paste, make sure an extra space doesn't come with it and make sure you enter it in all caps. For those in the US, also use the coupon code COREL99 to get free shipping. Users in Canada can get free shipping with the code CORELC99. Since I earn a commission if you buy using my links, I'll even send you an extra DVD filled with Photoshop plugs-ins, clip art and more; e-mail me (link is on this page if you don't know my address) your order number and your shipping address.

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Quick Route to Windows Explorer

Often when I am helping a user solve a problem, I'll ask the user to open Windows Explorer. It always surprises me that so many users have no idea what I'm talking about. First, Windows Explorer is not the same as Internet Explorer. Maybe you know Windows Explorer as "My Computer" though it is called "Computer" on Windows Vista and doesn't even appear on the desktop in Windows 7. Yet there is a very simple way to get to Windows Explorer. All you have to do is hold down the Windows key on your keyboard and press the letter E key.

I'm often asked how to get better at CorelDRAW. It is important to study all the different techniques in CorelDRAW. Yet so few users learn even the basics of using Windows, such as knowing how to launch Windows Explorer. So take some time and get to know Windows as it will only help you be more productive in CorelDRAW.

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Adjust Power Settings

When you are working on a laptop, it is easy to appreciate the power settings. Set everything just right and you can extend the life of a battery charge. On a desktop system, the power settings can help you save electricity. But if those settings slow down your productivity, is the savings worth it?

The good news is that you can decide exactly what you want if you are working in Vista or Windows 7. Go into Control Panel and run the Power Settings application. Even on my desktop, the default was set to "Balanced". All I know is that the hard drive would shut off every 20 minutes. Of course there are probably ten times each day when I have to wait 15-20 seconds for the hard drive to start back up so that I can do something. By adjusting the "Advanced Power Settings", I was able to change the idle time to 120 minutes. That should keep the hard drive on when I'm sitting at the computer. Look over all of the available settings and create a power profile that works for you.

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Turn Off the Eye Candy

We all want Windows to work as fast as possible, right? Part of the progress with Windows Vista and Windows 7 was the aero special effects. They look cool, but they also slow your system down. So if you care more about performance than eye candy, turn it off.

Open Control Panel and type the word "visual" in the search field. You'll be presented with several things you can do. One of them is "Adjust the appearance and performance of Windows". Click on it and select Adjust for best performance in the dialog box that appears. Click Apply and you should see a nice improvement in speed. Personally I would rather turn things off on my own. So under the selection for Adjust for best performance is a long list of things that can be adjusted. If you feel daring, turn off the ones you can live without. The more you turn off, the faster things go. But I'm guessing you don't want to turn them all off. Post a comment and let me know what you find the least useful in that list and what you find the most useful.

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An Interesting Use of the Object Data Manager

The Object Data Manager is one of those features that has been incredibly useful to a small percentage of users while being ignored by the vast majority. I'm sure that one reason it isn't used more often is that users just haven't found a way it should be used. So today I'm going to show you one way that a developer is using it to create interactive data on a cemetery. Follow the link and then click on the icon in the lower right corner of the page to see an example screen shot. As someone clicks on a lot number on the map of a cemetery, detailed data on that lot are provided in the Object Data Manager Docker.

Now I don't expect that most of you will be doing maps of a cemetery. But try to brainstorm about what else you might draw that would become even more useful if objects had data stored about them. I'm hoping this will inspire more of you to use the feature and I'd be thrilled if you would post a comment and tell us all about it.

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Memory and CorelDRAW

As much as I've tried to inform CorelDRAW users about the useless Memory setting, I still see it referenced on a regular basis. So I'm going to ask all of you to read a post from 2008 titled Memory Usage Setting Does Nothing.

The most recent reference I saw to this setting was from a user who had 5 GB of memory installed in their computer and was complaining that Corel PHOTO-PAINT only was using 2 GB. I thought it was a good time to re-visit this topic and well as explain a few more things.

If you are using a 32-bit operating system, you can use a maximum of 4 GB of RAM. That isn't a limitation imposed by CorelDRAW or any other software, it is imposed by Windows. And even if you have 4 GB of RAM, only around 3 GB will truly be available to use due to Windows limitations. I'm guessing that most of you have hardware that is capable of running a 64-bit operating system. The key is installing a version of Windows that is 64-bit. You can do this with Windows XP, Vista or 7. In fact, I'm pretty sure that all flavors of Windows 7 include both 32-bit and 64-bit versions in the box. It is simply a choice you make when installing. Before you run out and do this, you need to do some homework first.

When running a 64-bit operating system, you must have 64-bit drivers for your hardware. So check with the manufacturers of each of your devices and make sure such a driver exists. When I installed Windows 7 64-bit last fall, I had no problem finding drivers for my equipment. If you have older hardware, you might find it difficult to find a driver. This is especially true for some of the machines used in the production world such as laser engravers.

Unless you have a fairly new computer, I personally think you should wait to move to 64-bit when you get a new system just to make sure all the parts will have drivers. RAM is fairly inexpensive in comparison to other components. When I built my new computer, I installed the maximum RAM possible (12 GB). Just because that much memory exists does not mean CorelDRAW can use all of it. Even under a 64-bit operating system, 32-bit programs are still limited to 2 GB of memory each. The benefit of having a large amount of RAM is that you can have multiple "big" applications running at the same time and still have memory to spare. As I write this, I have six "big" applications and numerous smaller ones running and only 3.5 GB of memory is being used.

Even if you move to a 64-bit OS, CorelDRAW is still 32-bit software so it will not use more than 2 GB of memory. Unless you are working with some incredibly big bitmap images, that is well above what you need. Yes, the Memory setting in CorelDRAW will show you have more than 4 GB of  RAM and it will even let you change the setting to whatever number you want. I will repeat once again that the Memory Usage setting does absolutely nothing! So if it makes you feel better to change the setting, have fun. It just won't do anything to improve the performance at all. I can also pretty much guarantee that the development team will remove this in future versions so that users won't be under the impression it does anything.

I do encourage you to move to a 64-bit operating system. Just make sure your system and all of your hardware is ready for 64-bits. As more users move to 64-bits, I think we'll see more software released in a 64-bit version to take advantage of the new hardware and all that extra memory.

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Keep Your System Updated

I would find it hard to believe that any of you don't have some Adobe product on your system. If nothing else, you probably have Adobe Reader to view and print PDF files. Adobe released some very important security updates that covered Adobe Reader, Adobe Acrobat and other Adobe products. These patches address serious security concerns and should be installed as soon as possible. If the Adobe Updater doesn't get them automatically, go to the Help menu of any Adobe program and select Check for Updates. As I have the full CS4 suite on my system, it was nearly 400 MB of downloads and took nearly an hour.

The second Tuesday of the month is also the date when Microsoft releases their patches. So while you are updating, make sure to also install the latest updates for Windows and Office so that your system is protected against those who wish to do harm to our computing.

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Paste Special Can Be Special

When you are moving data between two programs, you probably just copy and paste. Power users automatically use the Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V shortcut keys to do this process quickly. Heck, they might even use Alt + Tab to switch between the two applications. For some content, this works great. But my focus today is to make you aware of the Paste Special command.

When you select Paste Special instead of Paste, you get a dialog box showing you all of the different formats available for pasting the data. The format listed first is what you get with the regular Paste command. Often I find the other formats are a lot more useful. Many programs offer the Paste Special command so you'll just need to look for it in the same place you'd find the Paste command. Once you get in the habit, you'll find that you get things done faster because you are getting the data in a better format.

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Beware of Fake Anti-Virus Software

When we talk about the end of one year and the beginning of the next, we often make resolutions about things we want to accomplish in the upcoming year. I know one thing we would also like to see decrease is the number of viruses and the volume of spam. Yesterday I ran across something that would cause both to increase and I wanted to write and warn you about it.

I was visiting a business Web site. Really, this wasn't a "bad" neighborhood. Out of the blue I got a message that my computer was about to be infected with something really bad. Sounds scary, right? Just don't fall for it! The giveaway that it is completely bogus is that the message is in your browser window. Of course the next step was an animation of a virus/spyware scan that showed my computer was badly infected. Before I did anything, I launched ZoneAlarm (my real anti-virus software) and had it do a full scan. Of course it found no infections at all.

When I tried to close the fake warning message, it tried to download an EXE file that was supposedly the virus software being promoted by the scam. I canceled it. When I tried to navigate away from the page, it tried to download again. Again I canceled. Once more it tried to download and I canceled. Finally I got back to a page that wasn't infected. The files it was trying to download were not anti-virus software, they were the virus itself!

I think I know how the Web site I was visiting was spewing out these fake messages. I revisited the Web site while writing this post so I could get screenshots and the problem was gone. If my guess is correct, most any site could be spewing out these messages even though the site itself is not the problem. All I can do it caution you to pay very, very close attention if you see messages about being infected.

I also strongly urge you to have legitimate, up-to-date anti-virus software. As mentioned earlier, my favorite is ZoneAlarm and there is a really nice sale on it right now (50% off). Make sure you double-check that your software is being updated regularly. If you got some anti-virus software included on your computer, it is quite possible the subscription has ended and you aren't as safe as you think you might be.

Just a few days ago I heard from a friend who had fallen for the exact scam I described earlier. Their computer is severely messed up and will require some serious geek love to get it back to its normal working condition. Not only are they unable to use their computer for a period of time, there will be a cost involved to fix the computer.

So I urge you to please be careful about where you click when surfing the Web. I don't want your computer to be infected because that probably means I get more spam. Of course I really don't want you to have to deal with getting the computer fixed. If you are really good about surfing safely, forward this blog post to all of your friends and family who don't surf safely. Let's all do our part to fight back against the criminals who want to make our online lives miserable!

I just found out that I had several very well off relatives in Nigeria who died recently and left me quite a fortune. I better get in touch with their lawyers immediately so I can receive the monies due to me! Please don't take this last paragraph seriously either. I'm sure you get plenty of similar messages and the best thing you can do is delete them!

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Fix the Holes

A loyal reader asked how to fix the holes after breaking apart text. Need to see what we're talking about? Type out the word "holes". Convert it to curves (Ctrl + Q). Now break it apart (Ctrl + K). The middle of the "o" no longer has a hole. After you have broken apart a string of text, select all the pieces of a "broken" letter and combine (Ctrl + L) them back together. In this situation, select the two pieces of the "o", combine them and the hole will be back. If you had the number 8, you'd have three pieces since there are two holes.

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Creating and Editing Duotones in CorelDRAW

A duotone image allows you to assign from one to four spot color inks to images. With an image selected, choose Bitmap | Mode | Duotone to bring up the Duotone dialog box where you can choose the number of inks and assign them. Once you've got the image just right, click OK and the duotone is created.

What seems baffling is that there is no way to edit the images. Or at least it may seem that way. With the image selected, use the same command to bring the dialog box back up with the current settings. Edit them as much as you like and click OK again to return to the drawing page. So while there is no obvious way to edit the files, you certainly can edit them in the same way they were initially created.

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Draw Lines to Find Perspective

A great way to learn about perspective is to use photos of buildings to find the vanishing point. If there are straight lines on the building, draw lines on top of each of those lines and extend them until all of the lines meet. That is your vanishing point. Remember, you can have a vanishing point in both the horizontal and vertical directions.

Once you've found the vanishing point(s), take the vector shapes you want to put into perspective, select Effects | Add Perspective and adjust the perspective by putting the vanishing points on top of the points you found earlier.

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Corel has announced their December deal on CorelDRAW and it is a good one. You save money on CorelDRAW, you get free shipping and you get a free copy of the T-Shirt Artwork Simplified book for free. The book alone sells for $99.95. Check out the details of the deal and make sure to take advantage before it ends on December 21, 2009.

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Nudge It

Nudging is one of the most powerful features added to CorelDRAW. It allows you to use the arrow keys on the keyboard to "nudge" objects by a defined amount. If you are working with the Shape tool, you can nudge nodes as well. In order to get the most out of the feature, make sure to set up the default nudge values to meet your needs.

Double-click either of the on-screen rulers to get the Tools | Options | Document | Rulers dialog box. At the top are the Nudge settings. By default, Nudge is set to .01 inches. I'm happy with that. The default Super nudge is set to 2. I change mine to 10. Similarly the Micronudge is set to 2 and I also change that to 10. Your preferences may differ. Once you've made your choices, click OK.

Select an object and press one of the arrow keys. It will move by .01 inches (or whatever you selected). Now how Shift and press an arrow key. That is a super nudge and mine will move the object by .1 inches. Try again using Ctrl and an arrow key and you get a micro nudge. For me that is .001 inches. If you are happy with the settings, choose Tools | Save Settings as Default and every new document you create will use those nudge values.

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Select All Tricks

When working in CorelDRAW, as well as most any other software, pressing Ctrl + A will select all. By default in CorelDRAW, it select all objects in your drawing. But there are a few tricks you can use to select other things. If a guideline is selected when you press Ctrl + A, it will select all guidelines. If a node is selected, it will select all nodes. Of course this information is included in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book, but I have forgotten it until I was reading one of the chapters today.

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Changing Outline Defaults

A loyal reader recently asked me how to change the default outline to a hairline. Picking the thickness you want is pretty simple. The key is knowing how to change the default outline. With nothing selected in CorelDRAW, bring up the Outline Pen dialog box (just press F12). This will first trigger a dialog asking if you want to change the defaults for Graphic, Artistic Text or Paragraph Text. Make your selection, click OK and you'll get the Outline Pen dialog box. Anything you select will become the new default for the current document. If you wish it to be the default for all new documents, select Tools | Save Settings as Default and it will affect every new file you create.

This is just one of the thousands of information nuggets you'll find in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book. The book may have an up-front cost, but it will deliver so much valuable information that it is an investment in boosting your productivity.

Speaking of business success, I wanted to give a shout out about a really good blog posted by the folks at Geekpreneur called How to Be a Lucky Entrepreneur. At times I have been accused of being lucky in business. Yet I think a large part of it has to do with my attitude and this post gives you some tips on how you can be lucky if you have the right attitude.

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The Many Flavors of EPS Files

We'll start out today with some tips on working with EPS files and then I'm asking for your help in answering a user's question. The first thing you need to understand about EPS files is that they were never meant to be edited. Read that sentence again. This means if you are able to edit an EPS file, you should consider it a bonus. Many EPS files will flat out fail when you try to edit them. This is not the fault of CorelDRAW, but rather that EPS files were never meant to be edited. Corel has done a good job of allowing us to edit many EPS files and we should be thankful for that.

The next thing to understand is that there are numerous flavors of EPS files. For many years, Adobe Illustrator files were a flavor of EPS. Those files will most likely import into CorelDRAW just fine though effects like gradient fills will be made up of numerous strips. Probably the worst thing I hear from users is when they export a file from CorelDRAW to EPS and then immediately try to re-import the EPS file to test it. Folks, you aren't testing anything! The file could import into CorelDRAW just fine and fail on the other end. Or it could fail to import and work just fine on the other end. If someone is blindly asking for an EPS file, you should ask them how they are planning to use the EPS file. Do they expect it to be editable? If so, you should probably export to a different format like Adobe Illustrator. Are they simply placing the file and printing it? EPS and/or PDF are probably the right choice in this situation but re-importing them won't prove anything to you.

For those who often work with suppliers requesting data, you should really get to know the file formats in depth so that you can supply functional artwork. You also need to fully understand the process on their end since many file formats come in a wide variety of flavors.

A user posted a very interesting question in the Graphics Unleashed Discussion Forums this week. A common type of graphic in the world of screen printing is a football or basketball complete with the texture of the ball. The person asking the question isn't sure how to successfully re-create the texture using spot colors and would love to hear suggestions. With all the screen printers reading this blog, I'm sure there is someone who can help. While visiting the forums, don't hesitate to post your own questions.

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Outlines That Don't Inflate the Border Size

A CorelDRAW user recently asked me if there was a way to create a box of an exact size with an outline on it. The most common usage of this would be to create a border around an ad. Remember that half of the outline is inside the shape and half is outside. So even if you draw a rectangle of the exact size, the outline will make it larger than what is allowed.

There is a simple answer for this, though it will take a couple of extra steps to create. Start by drawing a rectangle at the exact size you need. Now use the Contour effect to create a contour line inside of the original rectangle by the amount you want for the thickness of the border. Break apart the two objects making up the contour. Combine those two objects together. Fill the combined border with the color of your choice and remove the outline. Voila, you have a rectangle of the exact size you need with a border the exact thickness you desire.

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Move It While Drawing

Does that title mean anything to you? I bet not. It is probably pretty confusing. What I'm talking about it moving an object while drawing it in CorelDRAW. There is one huge gotcha with this feature. You have to be using a mouse. I can't get it to work at all when using a tablet.

Let's start with the rectangle tool. Click and drag to draw a rectangle. Before you let go of the left mouse button, press down the right mouse button. While you have both held down, move the rectangle wherever you want it to go. Now try it with an ellipse or a polygon or some other shape. Pretty cool isn't it?

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Duplicate Offset

In the last week I've had several users ask me about modifying the duplicate offset value in CorelDRAW. In every case the desire was to change the offset to zero. So this tip is very short and sweet. You don't need to change the duplicate offset value at all. Simply press the + key on the numeric keypad. It always makes a duplicate with an offset of zero.

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Weld Text

I had a user ask me a question about a week ago and the answer is something that may benefit many of you. He was wondering if there was a way to type text in a script font and somehow turn it into something that only had the outlines of the characters and not the overlap.

You know, I don't think that describes it very well so I want you to try something. Type the word "Script" and use a font like Brush Script. You'll notice that the lowercase letters all connect with each other as if you had written the word in cursive yourself. Switch to Wireframe view in CorelDRAW and you will see that the characters actually have a small amount of overlap. For those cutting vinyl or engraving, that overlap is a huge problem.

This user was exporting the text to a bitmap and then re-importing the bitmap and tracing the result. I told him I could solve the problem with one keystroke. The solution is to select the text and Weld it. You can do this by selecting Arrange | Shaping | Weld. I take that one step further by assigning the letter W as a custom shortcut key for the Weld command. So if I need the text to be welded, I simply press the W key and I'm done. That tip saved the user asking the question an enormous amount of time and gives higher quality results.

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Personalized Shortcut Key List

From time to time I get users asking me for a list of all of the shortcut keys available in CorelDRAW. Unfortunately there is no list of shortcut keys that will ever be accurate for all users. This is because users can create and modify shortcut keys to their liking.

The good news is that it is very easy for users to create their own list of shortcut keys including any customization they have done. Many users aren't aware of this simply because the functionality is buried deep in the software.

Select Tools | Options to get the Options dialog box. Expand the Workspace section in the tree list at left. Then expand the Customization section and click on Commands. Near the top right of the dialog box are three tabs. Click on the tab labeled Shortcut Keys and look to the bottom right of the dialog box for the View All button. Got it? Great, click on that button and you'll get the Shortcut Keys dialog box where you can export the list or print it. Now you need to start memorizing more of the keys! This should work in CorelDRAW 12-X4 and possibly in earlier versions. My memory doesn't go back any farther than that.

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The Number of Pixels Matters

I recently received an e-mail from a reader of my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book. He described an all too common problem that is easily remedied when you understand the importance of the number of pixels in an image. Yes, this is explained in the CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book, I'm guessing the person asking the question just hasn't made it to that chapter yet.

The user has created a similar title page in Lumapix FotoFusion and CorelDRAW X4. He was very happy with the printed quality from a JPEG file created in Lumapix and very disappointed with the quality of a JPEG file exported from CorelDRAW. To demonstrate the problem, the user sent me copies of each of the JPEG files. The file created in Lumapix FotoFusion was 2400 x 3600 pixels. The JPEG exported from CorelDRAW X4 was 576 x 792 pixels.

I'm sure you all see there is a huge difference in the two files simply by looking at the number of pixels. Let's assume that we wanted 300 dpi. The file from Lumapix FotoFusion would be 8 x 12 inches (2400/300 and 3600/300). The file exported from CorelDRAW would only be 1.92 x 2.64 inches. The really simple answer is to use a larger number of pixels when exporting from CorelDRAW. If the same number of pixels is used, I'm guessing the two files will be nearly identical.

The second problem I saw was that the user was using JPEG as the file format for the files even though the content was mostly text. I described a couple of months ago that JPG is NOT the Answer. That post described using JPEG for Web graphics, but the same thing applies when the graphic is going to be printed. Yes, this is also described in the CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book. The fact that the book answers so many common questions is why I recommend it to all CorelDRAW users. It is also important that users who get the book take the time to read the lessons and watch the movies included. Getting the most out of CorelDRAW requires an investment of time that will be easily repaid with increased productivity and also greatly increases the quality in situations like this one.

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10 Traits You Should Possess if You Want to be a Good Photographer

Regular readers surely know by now that I've spent a lot of time in the last few months trying to improve my photography skills. I ran across a very good blog post yesterday entitled 10 Traits You Should Possess if You Want to be a Good Photographer. In reading through the 10 Traits, I found myself agreeing with each of them. But I also noticed that you could substitute graphic design in place of photography in many of the items. So even if you aren't a photographer, you should give the list a look and see how some of the traits can make you better at design or at something else in your life.

Probably the one that jumped out to me the most was #9.

"You need to try a little bit harder than the next guy. The good photographers wait an extra 15 minutes for that perfect sunset color. They study their manual at night even when they are tired. They spend money they don’t have to attend workshops and buy books on photography. They go the extra mile…and then they do it again."

Let's plug in CorelDRAW to that statement. Many users just do the project at hand and don't worry about making themselves better. Learn more about the features you use and those you don't. Try to find new ways to get a project done in less time. Try to find examples of good design and learn from them. Having this focus will allow you to put out better designs in less time!

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Is CorelDRAW Awkward?

The folks at Vectortuts ran an article recently asking if CorelDRAW was awkward. I know I'm biased and I don't think it is awkward at all. I'm sure many of you feel the same way. Others probably disagree. I'll post a few of my thoughts on the article and the comments that follow. I encourage you to read it and provide your own thoughts in a comment.

The first section talks about navigation and leaves out the most important tip. Just press the N key on the keyboard to bring up the navigator. No need to go to the place they call tricky.

Next is a discussion of the freehand brushes. The writer talks about the difficult to do a quick hatching. Personally I've not had a need to create hatching. If I did, I wouldn't use the Freehand tool to do it. After that is praise for curve and node management. No disagreement from me on that point.

I found it funny that the writer talks about the clip art from v8 as well as the Hedy Lamarr illustration on the v8 box. Not that there wasn't good art included in the older versions, but I'm not sure how that relates to the mesh fill tool. And Corel certainly isn't a fan of Hedy Lamarr after they lost an expensive lawsuit over that illustration.

More praise is given for the Boolean tools (Weld, Trim, Intersect, Combine, etc), the effects tools and color separation/prepress. I definitely agree. The writer has an issue with screen refreshing and needs to press Ctrl + W often. Some users have this, some don't. I'm one who doesn't often have this problem. I'm sure it is somewhat hardware related. After there are positive comments about the PowerTRACE utility.

A number of very nice sample images are provided that show the artistic power of CorelDRAW. I guess what I see missing is the vast amount of production art that is created by average users on a daily basis.

After the article are comments from users. There are certainly some biased comments from users of Illustrator. Nowhere did the writer say Illustrator wasn't any good, but the commenters certainly have lots of negative (and false) things to say about CorelDRAW. If someone has a valid point, I'd open to hear about it. But people who have never (or rarely) used a piece of software can't really give a valid comment. Of course there are also some people who claim to be former CorelDRAW users who are happy to leave the bugs behind. There are bugs in CorelDRAW, I don't dispute that. But there are bugs in every piece of software on the market. If a user prefers a different piece of software, that is fine. Just don't talk about how buggy CorelDRAW is if you haven't used it in years.

Read the article and comments yourself and post your thoughts. I'm curious to see what you, the readers, have to say.

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How to Get Paid for your Flickr Photos

Many of you work with photos and I'm guessing that you would like ways to monetized at least some of those photos. I ran across a great blog post at Photopreneur that describes How to Get Paid for your Flickr Photos. Obviously the more quality photos you have in your portfolio, the more likely you are to bring in a nice source of revenue. But it only takes one great photo to have a great payday.

The instructions are very detailed and certainly not at all complicated. Give the post a look and see if you can start making some money from your photos at Flickr. If you like the ideas about Flickr, you may want to look at the 99 Ways To Make Money From Your Photos book from the same Photopreneur folks. My plate is way too full right now, but I plan to get a copy for myself in the near future to see which of the ways will work with my photography. Of course you can also subscribe to the Photopreneur blog.

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Keyword Your CorelDRAW Files

When you create a file in CorelDRAW and save it, do you make sure to include keywords in the file? I'm guessing most of you not only don't include keywords, you may not even realize their importance. Today I'm going to try and clear that up for you.

First, we need to talk about how to add keywords. For those using CorelDRAW X3 and older, you do it in the Save or Save As dialog box. If there is not an area labeled "Keywords" and another labeled "Notes" at the bottom of the dialog box, click the Options button to expand the dialog. In the keywords field, you can enter as many as eight keywords separated by commas. More information can be included in the notes field.

Users of CorelDRAW X4 should select File | Document Properties before saving their file. Again, type in your keywords separated by commas. If there is a limit to the number, I haven't found it yet. Also, you can use Unicode characters in your keywords. This is especially helpful for those of you in parts of the world with extended character sets. Again, you can also enter notes. While you're at it, you can even assign a rating for your file from one to five stars.

What should you enter as keywords? I highly recommend including the month, year, name of client, name of project and then anything else that would help identify the file.

For me, the most powerful reason to have keywords is so that you can build catalogs with the free ROMCat utility and then search those catalogs by keywords. Searching can also be done by Windows Vista and Windows 7. While I have yet to try it, I believe you can also use Windows Desktop Search in Windows XP to search your files. The reason I haven't tried is that I find ROMCat to be the best way to find my CorelDRAW files.

Start keywording your files now and you'll find it much easier to search for your files in the future by using keywords in your search!

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How Many Megapixels Do You Need?

The relationship between pixels and dpi seems to confuse many users. If you are confused, I highly recommend you read K.N. Pepper's DPI, PPI, Pixels - Facts and Fallacies before you continue.

When users are looking at digital cameras, they want to know the largest print they can print with good quality. I've put together a chart that gives you an idea of how many megapixels you need to have to print at various sizes. Since even a low megapixel camera can print smaller prints, the smallest size listed is 8" x 12" and the chart goes all the way to a 50" x 75" print.

While green is definitely good, the other colors aren't necessarily bad. Not only do you need to know the output size, but also the viewing distance. If the viewer is standing with two feet of the print, it is much different than if they are standing ten feet away from the print. Hopefully this chart will give you a better idea of how many megapixels you need for the projects at hand.

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Misunderstanding Markup

Most of you deal with creating graphics of all sorts. I'm sure some of those graphics are destined for the Web and many of you probably also do some design of Web sites. Even though you might rely on a WYSIWYG tool for creating Web sites, it is very important to understand the basics of page markup.

When you start looking at markup, you'll run into HTML, CSS, XHTML, XML and all kinds of other acronyms for markup languages. I ran into a cute comic strip that helps explain the differences between XHTML 2 and HTML 5. When you first load the graphic, it may be tiny. Just click on it and it should expand to a larger size. Or right-click on the graphic and download the file.

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Set Your Default Outline

A loyal reader contacted me by e-mail and wondered how to set outline properties so that the new settings would be the default in the future. This tip should work in all recent versions of CorelDRAW. For those who are not yet on CorelDRAW X4, today is the last day of the special $129 upgrade pricing!

OK, on to the tip. Let's say you want to make sure that Scale with Image is turned on for any graphics that you create. It could be a different outline width, color or any other outline property. With no objects selected in your file, click on the Outline Pen tool or just press F12. You'll get a dialog box telling you that nothing is selected and asking if you want to change the defaults. You can choose whether the changes apply to a Graphic, Artistic Text, Paragraph Text or any variation of the three. Once you click OK, you'll get the Outline Pen dialog box. Change whatever you want to change. For our example, we'll turn on Scale with Image. Click OK to exit the Outline Pen dialog box and you have changed the default for the current document and only the current document. Now select Tools | Save Settings as Defaults. That will change the default for all new documents. It will not change any existing files.

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JPG is NOT the Answer for All Web Graphics

There was someone who often promoted themselves as an expert in CorelDRAW and still claims to be a guru in the world of graphics. Yet this person has often made a horrendous mistake with the main banner on their Web site. It isn't because they don't know better as numerous people have pointed out the problem and yet it still exists to this day. I'll let the offender remain nameless, but I'll show you an example similar to what is on their site so you can avoid the problem.

For some Web graphics, JPG is the best answer. But it is not the answer for all graphics. In fact, it is a horrible answer for the type of graphic being discussed today. JPG is great for graphics with a large number of colors like photos. GIF or PNG is better for graphics with a limited number of colors.





Look carefully at the images above. Which one looks best to you? Go ahead, make a choice.

One of the images is 10.5 KB and the other is 3.73 KB. Guess what, the graphic that looks best is the smaller file! Hopefully you all guessed that the top image looks the best. It is a GIF file saved with 32 colors. The bottom graphic is a JPG saved at a compression level of 25 using 4:4:4 Sub format. I could have used less compression and it would have looked better. But that would have only made the file smaller.

Maybe some of you didn't see how bad the JPG looked. Below you will see the upper left of the letter "S" zoomed in to 400%.

Notice all the blotchiness? That is what JPG compression does to an image. Some of you will say to reduce the compression used for the JPG file, but that will only make the file larger and it is already three times as large as the GIF file. I'm not going to supply a zoomed in version of the GIF file since there really isn't anything to see. There is no blotchiness at all.

So before you save graphics for the Web, make sure you understand the pros and cons of each file format. Those who believe JPG is always the best answer are in for a rude surprise when dealing with graphics containing a limited number of colors. Not only does it look bad, it makes large files. It can also show your clients that you aren't the right designer for the job.

For those who want to learn more about creating Web graphics with CorelDRAW and Corel PHOTO-PAINT, there is a wealth of information in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book.

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Scale Images Before Posting on the Web

When different people look at a Web page, there can be a valid debate as to whether the site is attractive or not. Not everyone likes the same thing. Yet there are technical aspects of the site that can not be disputed as to whether they are right or wrong. Today I'll talk about the horrendous practice of including pictures directly from a digital camera on a Web page.

Before we continue with this discussion, I want to get one thing out of the way right now. Resolution is an absolutely meaningless number when it comes to Web graphics. Don't believe me? Stop right now and read K.N. Pepper's DPI, PPI, Pixels - Facts and Fallacies tutorial.

Today I was providing a critique for a client about a local business' Web site. On one of the pages was an image that was obviously taken directly from a digital camera and posted on the site. The file was a 3.5 MB JPG file with pixel dimensions of 3000 x 4000 pixels. The site "designer" allowed the browser to scale the image to 130 x 173 pixels. Sorry, I struggle to call the "designer" by that title since this is just one of a number of severe technical errors made in putting together the site. And yes, they are charging the client for their skills.

I opened the image in Corel PHOTO-PAINT and used the Image | Resample command to change the number of pixels to the same 130 x 173 pixels specified in the HTML code. The file I saved was 21 KB. That's smaller than the original file by a factor of about 1500 and it looks better! In fact, I can get the file even smaller by removing the EXIF data stored in the file. To do this we'll use the Stripfile utility I mentioned a few months ago in this blog. After stripping the extraneous data, the file was 7.84 KB. So the original file was 458,147 times larger than the file that was created properly. My finished image is shown at right.

Using extra large files on a Web site will causes pages to load very slowly. This slow speed could scare away visitors. Losing visitors will cost you. Plus it adds a vast amount of unnecessary bandwidth and that can also cost you. Make sure to scale your images to the proper size before posting them on a Web site. That extra minute or two you spend can save you a lot of money in the long run!

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Create Your Own Palettes

I'm not sure the exact number of color palettes supplied with CorelDRAW, but there are at least fifty of them. Probably even twice that many. Yet there are times it seems like you just can't find the color you want. Or maybe there are projects that require a specific set of colors. The good news is that there is an easy solution: create your own palettes!

Select Window | Color Palettes | Palette Editor to get the Palette Editor dialog box. Once there, you can modify an existing palette or simply create a new one from scratch. Add colors, delete colors, choose how the colors are sorted and much more. Over the past couple of years, I've create several custom palettes for my projects and it has made things go much more smoothly. Now I only have the colors I need in the palette and I can quickly select exactly what I want. For more details on the process as well as a movie showing the feature in action, get a copy of my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book.

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Run Your LCD Monitor at Native Resolution!

I covered the topic of running LCD monitors at their native resolution a little over a year ago. It is an extremely important topic that I'm going to discuss again today because of a phone call I had recently with a student from a previous CorelDRAW Unleashed Boot Camp.

This gentleman had spent over three hours on the phone with a tech support representative from Corel and they weren't able to find out why the edges of rectangles were distorted. At the end of the call, the support representative suggested that he give me a call. That definitely made me feel good!

Anyways, I tried the steps outlined by the customer and I had absolutely no problem with the rectangle showing distortion. Plus the customer had both printed and laser engraved the rectangle and it output without distortion. It was very obvious that the distortion was a function of the monitor.

We checked the monitor's settings and it was set to 1024 x 768 because his "eyes aren't as good as they used to be". Believe me, I understand that reasoning as much as anyone since I'm pretty sure bifocals are in my near future. I had him change his resolution to the native settings of his LCD monitor and the distortion was magically gone.

I just can't stress enough that you must run your LCD monitors at the native resolution or you will have problems! The upside is that you are able to get more information on the screen at the higher resolutions. I run mine at 2560 x 1600 on a 30" screen and absolutely love that I can have so much stuff available at all times. Or I have lots of extra room for designing, laying out documents or whatever else I'm doing at the moment.

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Know Your Output Device

It is a common complaint. Users are frustrated at the colors they get from their printer. Understanding color management is definitely an important part of the process and something every user needs to understand. Before you can set up color management, you have to know more about your output device. For the sake of this post, I'm color to call them all printers though we could be referring to a laser engraver, a vinyl cutter or some other method.

First it is important to know if the device works with PostScript. Go to the Print dialog box in CorelDRAW. Do you see a tab labeled PostScript? If so, you are printing to a PostScript printer. If you don't see it, it is a non-PostScript device. A basic distinction that makes a big difference in how you design your files.

I realize that you probably have CMYK inks in your printer, but if it isn't a PostScript device then Windows will send it RGB data. If you design your file using CMYK colors, Windows will convert it to RGB and then the printer will convert it back to CMYK. See a problem? To get the best looking output, you need to design in RGB! Also keep in mind that many printers have even more colors of ink. To get the most out of all those extra colors, you still want to design in RGB. This allows the printer to use the extra inks to get the widest range of colors.

Only when you will be printing to a PostScript printer do you want to design in CMYK. Now if you've set up your color management properly, you can still design in RGB and allow CorelDRAW to do the conversion to CMYK when you print.

This is a major part of your printer's capabilities, but you should also get to know all of the other settings. The more you know, the better you can design files to take advantage of everything your printer can do.

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Limit Your Pages

I got an emergency e-mail from someone yesterday that sounded all too familiar. This user had spent fifteen hours creating a nine page file. Now the file won't open because one object in the file was corrupt. Of course it was needed immediately. Since I know this user fairly well and know how their files are used, it really was due immediately and is used by multi-millionaires on a regular basis.

Believe me, Corel should make their files foolproof so this doesn't happen. The reality is that file corruption can be a problem and it can also be avoided. In all my years of using CorelDRAW, I've yet to have a file go corrupt except in the case of a physical hard drive failure. And in that case I had backups. Whew!

So now for me to rant a bit about the way you use CorelDRAW. There are many users who want to use CorelDRAW to lay out long documents. Some users even proudly profess how they created documents with hundreds or even a thousand pages. Even if file corruption wasn't an issue, you are wasting hours upon hours of time by using the wrong software for the job. CorelDRAW is illustration software that has the ability to lay out short documents. Yes, you can have up to 9999 pages (heck, it may be more). But when you push the limits, you get burned!

Typically I suggest keeping documents to no more than four to eight pages. I might make an exception if the pages contain a limited number of objects. If you must create a longer document, make it up as a series of files limited to four pages. Then create a master document to import each of the smaller documents or simply combine the files together when you print or Publish to PDF.

I also highly recommend you create your files in stages. Every hour or so, rename the file with a new name. This way you can always go back to a slightly older file if the most recent goes corrupt. Of course you should also have a backup strategy for all of your artwork, but that is a topic for another day.

Those of you creating long documents on a regular basis should really look at using CorelDRAW for its strengths (graphics) and then combining that with a program designed for laying out documents. My favorite has always been Corel Ventura but I am slowly migrating to Adobe InDesign due to a lack of Corel support for Ventura. Even Serif PagePlus is a nice lower-cost alternative that is better suited to longer documents.I think this is a problem Corel should address by reviving Ventura. Unfortunately I don't think that is going to happen.

Many users say Corel should add features to CorelDRAW to make it work better for long documents. They want page numbering, headers/footers and more. I really think it would be a disaster to go down this road. CorelDRAW may become better at longer documents by doing this. But have you heard the term "jack of all trades, master of none"? These features would undoubtedly bloat the program and it wouldn't be as good for the areas where it is great today. You don't use a chain saw to cut boards do you? It might work, it just isn't the best tool for the job!

I'd love to hear your thoughts. Post a comment and tell me what you think.

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Thursday Tip: Step and Repeat

One of the lesser known features added in CorelDRAW X3 is the Step and Repeat Docker. With this Docker, you can specify offset values and the number of copies you wish to make. When you have an object or group of objects that needs to be accurately positioned and copied at various places on the page, this is the feature for you. You can get to it in CorelDRAW X3 and CorelDRAW X4 by selecting Edit | Step and Repeat.

Now that I've told you about Step and Repeat, I'll also warn you that I see many users using Step and repeat when they should be using the Imposition feature in Print Preview. Business cards are a good example of this. Users feel they have to manually copy eight cards and place them perfectly on the page. This is a productivity drain! Set your page size to the size of a single card and create an eight page document with each card on a separate page. Then let the imposition engine place them perfectly on a single sheet. That's a tip for another day. I just wanted to warn you now so you don't misuse Step and Repeat.

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Thursday Tip: Pop-Up Palettes Redux

Last August I showed you the pop-up palettes you can get in CorelDRAW. For those who don't want to read the old post, left-click and hold a color in the color palette for a couple of seconds and you'll get a pop-up palette with 49 variations if using RGB or CMYK and 10 variations if using a spot color. An example is shown at right. The color in the middle is the color in the main palette surrounded by 48 variations.

I'm repeating this tip because of a message someone posted this week in a discussion area. The person posting had just learned this tip and thought it was amazing. It is and hopefully it is new for some of you. The reason I bring it up is because this user was someone that I would say has advanced knowledge in CorelDRAW. Nobody knows everything about CorelDRAW. I know a lot and I'm not even close to knowing everything. If anyone ever tells you that they do know it all, they're lying!

After a few more messages were posted, it came out from another advanced user that they would prefer to poke around on the Internet to find little tips like this. Really? You'd waste hours of time to dig up a few nuggets of information when resources like my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book, this blog and Jeff Harrison's Powertips have compiled a bunch of tips in one place? Yes, two of the things I mentioned have a cost. How much is your time worth? If you spend an hour on the Internet to find one tip, how much did that tip cost you? I bet it was more than one of Jeff's Powertips tutorials and those each have many tips in them. Sometimes users get so caught up in the "gotta have it for free" mentality that they will instead waste hours of time instead of spending a small amount of money. Sure, I want to sell my book so I make money. But I also feel the book will make you a lot more money with the time-saving techniques you learn. Let me waste my time searching all over for the great tips so that I can compile them all in one place for you!

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Several of you who subscribe to this blog via e-mail have written me about how painfully slow the messages are to load in your mailreader. I subscribe to this blog and others via e-mail and I know exactly how bad it is. We use Feedburner (owned by Google) to provide the blog to you via e-mail. Recently they added or modified a Google tracker icon in the e-mails and it is causing the problem. It affects all blogs (thousands upon thousands of them) e-mailed by Feedburner. That is a huge number and I've got to think there are a lot of upset bloggers and blog subscribers out there. Many of the bloggers, including me, have reported the problem to Feedburner and I fully expect that they will get it back to normal soon or there just may be a riot in the blogosphere. So if you could please be patient, I'll keep bugging them about it and I'll cross my fingers that they get it fixed quickly.

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Thursday Tip: Choosing the Correct Color

There are many aspects to getting the right color. Part of the problem is calibrating your devices so the color you get on screen matches the color from your output devices. That is a massive subject that I tackle in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book.

One of the first hurdles you need to overcome is choosing the right color model when designing. We basically have three color models: RGB, CMYK and spot. When to use each one can be a long discussion, but I'll try to give the abbreviated version.

Spot colors are most often used in the world of screen printing and for offset printing when only a limited number colors is needed. Spot colors allow special inks for fluorescent, metallic and all kinds of other specialty colors that can't be represented in other color models.

RGB has traditionally been used when designing for a screen. That would include Web design and PowerPoint presentations. I also use it for designing my CorelDRAW Unleashed books since they are delivered on screen. These days it is often the color model of choice for some printing methods. Garment printers may take CMYK ink, but they are seen as RGB devices by Windows. Many ink jet printers allows for more than four colors of ink so RGB will allow the printer to use the full gamut available with those extra inks. I even send RGB designs to a Xerox digital press because the software in the press gives me more vibrant colors than designing in CMYK.

CMYK has traditionally been used in the offset printing world. If you are designing in CMYK, make sure to invest in a good swatch book so you can specify colors from printed swatches instead of based on what you see on screen.

That is a quick overview of the three main color models and when they should be used. I've already listed some exceptions to the rules and there are certainly many more. If you don't understand these models, please study up on them. I do cover them in more depth in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book. Those of you who have a copy can simply go to the Working with Color chapter.

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Thursday Tip: The Cool Switch

I was reading some information about Windows 7 and they talked about the entry-level version and its ability to run no more than three applications at a time. That would be painful for me since I'm always running at least five apps and probably more. Luckily that entry level version is probably not the version any of us will use. I know I won't.

When you are running a bunch of applications, you need a quick way to switch from one to another. That's where the cool switch comes into play. Just press Alt + Tab and you'll see the icons of all running programs. Continue to press it and you can cycle through each of the icons until you get to the program you want to bring to the front. No, you don't need Windows 7 for this cool feature. It works just fine in Windows XP. Added in Windows Vista was Ctrl + Tab that actually shows a thumbnail of each application. Of course you have to be running all of the machine-slowing graphics features (called Aero) in Vista for this feature to work. I just stick to Alt + Tab and life is good.

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Thursday Tip: File Naming Conventions

If you have been creating artwork for more than a few months, you have compiled thousands of files. Unfortunately, the more files you have, the harder it can be to find them. That's why it is very important to come up with a file naming convention that works for you. Today I'm going to provide a few of my file naming conventions and hopefully you can build on it. Those of you who have a good system, please post a comment and share it with us.

The first part of my file organization strategy starts with the hard drives in my machine. I always have three drive letters. The C drive is where I store my operating system and nothing more. The D drive is where I install all of my software. Well, almost all of it. Unfortunately some software developers force you to install in a location that isn't desired. So that stuff ends up on the C drive and earns my wrath against that developer. Lastly, the E drive is where I put data. Just knowing where the data is stored makes the search for a file a bit easier.

Each major project (or client) then gets a folder. Inside of that could be multiple levels of subfolders. That brings us to the file names. I will often save multiple versions of the same file. In that case, I append "-xxx" to the end of the file name where the "xxx" is a number. Anytime I append numbers, I always put in more digits than I expect will be needed. That way I don't have to renumber everything should that extra digit that you didn't think you need really becomes necessary. For graphics files, I often include the colorspace in the name as well by using "-rgb", "-cmyk", "-bw" or "-spot" as needed. I mainly deal with RGB so it is my assumed colorspace if I don't put the extension on it.

When working with CorelDRAW files, I also find it useful to save keywords within the file. Then I can use the free ROMCat utility to catalog and search my drive.

I know my system is probably more complex than what some of you use. Yet I've definitely heard from users who have a much more regimented system. If you don't already have a good naming convention in place, get one soon! For those that already have a good system, please share it with us!

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Thursday Tip: Don't Open Bitmaps

Every now and then I see a user who complains that CorelDRAW can't open a JPG or TIF or some other bitmap format. That's correct, you can't open any bitmap format in CorelDRAW. If you instead use the import command, they should work just fine.

Remember that CorelDRAW's primary purpose is editing vector graphics. That's why you can't "open" bitmap files. If you need to open bitmaps for editing, use Corel PHOTO-PAINT instead. With this team of programs, you can edit a wide variety of vector and bitmap graphics.

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Thursday Tip: Use the Settings Button

One of the best features in recent versions of CorelDRAW is the ability to Publish to PDF. This makes it very easy to create a file to send to others. Just yesterday I had someone call me completely stumped because fonts were not being embedded in the PDF files they were creating. That leads to today's tip. Use the Settings button!

First, you'll select File | Publish to PDF from CorelDRAW. This brings you to a dialog box that asks you to name the file. In the lower left you'll find a list of Presets. Choose the one that most closely fits the file you are saving. But do not press the Save button just yet! Make sure you press the Settings button to bring you to a dialog box with numerous options. This is where the power of the feature can truly be unlocked. If you are unsure of what all those options do, I dedicate a chapter to the feature in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed ebook.

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Thursday Tip: Include Non-Printing Notes in Your Files

I don't use layers often in CorelDRAW. For my workflow, I just don't find a great need for them. Today I'm going to describe a way that I think they can come in handy for you.

Create a layer named "Notes" or something to that effect. If you are using CorelDRAW X4, you'll have to create that layer on each page of your document. Like many of you, I'm not crazy about the new layer behavior. Unfortunately there is nothing we can do about that. Once you have created the Notes layer, go into the Object Manager Docker and make that layer visible and not printable.

Now that you have the layer, you can put any notes about the project on that layer. You'll be able to see them on screen, but they won't print or export. If you find they are getting in your way, make the layer invisible as well. You can always make it visible again later. And if you find you need to print the notes, make the layer printable and print it.

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Thursday Tip: Changing Pages in Full Screen Preview

Do all of you use Full Screen Preview when working in CorelDRAW? It is the magic screen that shows only your artwork on the entire screen. No interface to distract you, just the artwork.

You can take this preview even further by pressing the PageUp and PageDown keys on your keyboard. If you are working in a multi-page file, it will scroll up and down through those pages. Go ahead, select View | Full Screen Preview in CorelDRAW and check it out.

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Thursday Tip: Update Your Protection

There was a lot of talk yesterday about the Conficker worm. The good news was that it was mostly talk and very few problems. I guess what surprises me is that so many computers are vulnerable when it is fairly easy to avoid most of these problems. I'm going to list a few basic steps below.

1. Make sure you keep your operating system updated. With Windows, that means running the Windows Update or Microsoft Update tools at least once a month. Yes, this takes time. Just imagine how much time you might lose if your computer gets infected.
2. Keep your anti-virus and firewall updated. Some users get a free subscription with a new computer and they don't realize that it only lasts for a limited time. If it expires and you aren't getting new updates, you are exposing your computer to new threats that appear every day. Make sure you are also scanning your computer on a regular basis so that you can catch anything that might slip through.
   
3. Keep any other software that works on the Internet updated. That can include programs like Adobe Reader, Quicktime, Web browsers, mail clients and more. These updates should be free.
4. If an e-mail looks or sounds fishy, there is a good chance it is phishy. This could lead to information getting stolen or visiting a rogue Web site that will infect your computer. But please be careful about setting your spam filters too high. Not a day goes by that a customer doesn't yell at me because they haven't gotten an e-mail from us they expected. I won't say that we have never messed up, but well over 99% of the problems are because the e-mail got eaten by a spam filter. If you are expecting e-mail, make sure you allow those addresses to send you mail.
5. If you go to questionable Web sites, the chances of getting infected are much higher. I'm not even going to try to define questionable here, but I'm sure you can figure out sites that could be problematic. Stay away from those sites and chances are much lower you'll get infected.
   

I'm sure I could list even more rules, but those five should take care of many of the potential problems. If you just take a few precautions, you should be able to work without having to constantly worry about the security issues out there.

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Thursday Tip: The Default Font

Do you really want Arial to be the default font in all of your projects? Don't worry, you can easily change it. With no objects selected, choose the Text tool in CorelDRAW. Change the font on the Property Bar to the one you want as the default. You'll get a dialog that asks if you want it to be the default for Artistic Text, Paragraph Text or both. Select the one that you want and you've now changed the default for the current document. You can change the size, bold, italic and other attributes in the same fashion. Once you have it just right, you're a couple of clicks away from making it the default for all new documents. Select Tools | Save Settings as Default and you're all done.

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Thursday Tip: Property Bar Calculator

The Property Bar in CorelDRAW can be used as a calculator. Let's say you have a rectangle already drawn and you want it to be 2.5 times wider and taller. In the width box on the Property Bar, *2.5 after the current width and press Enter. Repeat for the height. You can also add, subtract, divide and more. Give it a try and you'll be amazed at how useful this can be.

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Thursday Tip: Moving the Rulers

This hidden gem goes back to very early versions of CorelDRAW so it should work for any version you are using. It is sometimes handy to move the rulers a little closer to your design. Simply Shift-click on the ruler and drag it out over your page. If you are viewing the rulers in Corel PHOTO-PAINT, it works there as well. When done, Shift-click and drag the ruler back to the edge of the screen. Even quicker, Shift-double-click and it goes back automatically.

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Thursday Tip: Speed Up File Operations in CorelDRAW X4

Some users of CorelDRAW X4 complain that file operations like opening and saving are much slower than in previous versions. Others don't experience these problems. I'm one of the lucky ones in that regard, but viewing a folder full of CDR files in Windows Explorer was painfully slow. After talking with some of my friends at Corel, I found a solution to the folder slowness and I think the same issue is causing the slowness when opening files.

Starting with CorelDRAW X4, the CDR file is actually a zip file in disguise. If you really want to test this, rename a copy of a CDR file with a ZIP extension and open it up in your favorite ZIP program. Of course Corel prefers you use WinZip. :) By using a ZIP file in disguise, this can provide a number of benefits such as larger thumbnails, thumbnails for each page, many more keywords, ratings and a lot more. The downside is that your security software (mainly anti-virus software) sees the files as ZIP files and a potential threat to the security of your system. Every time you open a file, the anti-virus software has to take a close look at the file to make sure there is nothing dangerous within.

So to speed up opening files and to make it quicker to browse folders, you need to tell your anti-virus software to not process CDR files. By doing so, you are creating the very slim possibility of being infected by a CDR file. I've never heard of one being infected and thus the reason it is a very slim chance.

This probably won't have much of an effect on saving files. Most of the slowness there is from creating thumbnails. X4 is creating a larger thumbnail than previous versions and it will also generate separate thumbnails for each page. This means documents with a higher number of pages will take significantly longer to save. As I rarely create documents with more than one or two pages, the saving issue does not affect me. Users who regularly create longer documents have been the most vocal critics of the slower speed.

Corel is certainly well aware of the situation and I'm sure they will find a way to speed things up in future versions. If you do create documents with many pages, maybe you'll want to skip CorelDRAW X4 and wait. The vast majority of you won't see any significant difference since you have a small number of pages.

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Thursday Tip: Treat As Filled

There are a handful of default settings in CorelDRAW that I absolutely detest. I can argue that they are the wrong settings for me, but other users really like these settings so they do have value to someone. Today I'm going to vent about the Treat as Filled setting. When this is activated, all objects are treated as if they have a fill. This means you can click inside of them and they will be selected. Sounds simple enough.

Where the function really fails for me is that if an unfilled object is above other objects, it makes it a lot more difficult to select those objects. Back in early versions of CorelDRAW, the only way to select an unfilled object was to click on its outline. Turning off Treat as Filled will revert to that behavior. Seems simple enough to me and then I'm not frustrated trying to select one object and accidentally selecting something else.

For several versions there was a button on the Property Bar to toggle this option on and off. In CorelDRAW X4, it is absolutely buried in the Options dialog box. Press Ctrl + J to bring up the Options dialog. Then navigate to Workspace | Toolbox | Pick Tool. There you will find an option labeled "Treat all objects as unfilled". It is checked by default making it more difficult to select objects. If you uncheck it, you will have to click the outline of an object to select it. That's the way I prefer it!

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Thursday Tip: How to Make Your Web Site Really, Really Fast

If you get a customer to visit your Web site, one of the worst things that can happen is that the page loads so slow that they leave. How much marketing money did you spend to attract that person? It can be money down the drain if they leave.

What is one of the biggest and fastest sites on the Web? If you guessed Google, you guessed correct. Steve Souders of Google put together a list of tips to help you speed up your site. Some of this may be a little bit technical if you are new to Web design. For those who want their sites to continue to grow, this information is golden! I know that I am going to be going over it to see how I can find ways to speed up this site.

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Thursday Tip: Beware of the Web Image Optimizer

Those of you who have read my book know that I steer you away from using the Web Image Optimizer in CorelDRAW. The idea is that it simplifies exporting graphics for use on the Web. The reality is that it makes things much more complicated.

My biggest beef is that there is no easy way to control the size (in pixels) of the graphic it creates. In fact, you can export the same graphic from the same exact file and get bitmaps of two different pixel sizes. This is because the exported size not only looks at the size of the graphic in CorelDRAW but is also dependent on the zoom level.

You are much better off selecting the graphic you wish to export and choosing File | Export. From there you will need to choose between GIF, PNG and JPG depending on the graphic and you will have to enter the exact size in pixels manually. But at least you know what size you are going to get every single time!

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Thursday Tip: Re-Ordering Pages in CorelDRAW

As with most tasks, there is more than one way to re-order pages in CorelDRAW. One of the quickest ways is to use the page markers at the lower left of your screen. Simply click on the page marker of the page you want to move and drag it to where you want the page to appear. That's it, done!

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Thursday Tip: Smart Duplicate

There are times I wish I could duplicate myself. It would provide more time in the day! Puerto Vallarta is now in the rear view mirror as the CorelDRAW Unleashed Boot Camp Cruise sails towards Long Beach, California. That means we have a full day in the classroom on the ship later today.

Smart Duplicate often catches users by surprise. They consider it a bug because they didn't expect it to happen. Press Ctrl + D to duplicate an object. That works as expected. Now move, resize, rotate or make other modifications to the duplicate. Press Ctrl + D again. Not only will you get another duplicate, but notice that the duplicated object is also transformed with the same manner as the previous duplicate. Until you deselect the object, Ctrl + D will continue to produce smart duplicates.

Today is a big day for me. That's right, it's my birthday. I don't often ask much from readers except for a blog comment every now and then. Occasionally I'll be asked if there is a way to provide thanks for the content I provide. A thank you e-mail is always appreciated. For those who want to do something more, I've provided a donate button below that allows you to send me cold hard cash. How about a dollar for every year of my age? OK, even a dime would be fantastic, but you have to guess my age. For once I'll be thrilled if you guess high.

Thanks for reading and I do hope each and every one of you find something of value!

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Thursday Tip: Go to the CD/DVD

When people install CorelDRAW X3 or X4, they will find that a variety of presets/content is available for features within the program. But what often gets overlooked is that there is even more on the CD/DVD. The full-color pattern fills are a good example. Forty-four of them get installed automatically. But there are 294 more on the disc that do not get installed. Bitmap pattern fills are very similar with 60 installed and 250 more on the disc. So before you go looking for additional content from others, look on the discs that came with the software for all kinds of goodies that you may not have known about.

For those who downloaded CorelDRAW, you won't get all of that extra content. This is one of the primary reasons I always suggest you purchase the boxed version of CorelDRAW.

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Thursday Tip: To Overlay or Not To Overlay

When users are describing their preferred interface in Corel PHOTO-PAINT, I hear a big divide on one specific aspect of the interface. Some people prefer to work with one of the defaults and that is to leave the Mask Overlay turned on. Others either are frustrated by the overlay or they have switched it off.

There isn't a right and a wrong way to do it, only your personal preference. If you find it easier to work with the pink overlay, the default is perfect. If you'd prefer to have marching ants delineate your mask, select Mask | Mask Overlay and turn it off (no checkmark next to it). You can also change the color of the overlay or of the mask marquee (marching ants) by selecting Tools | Options and going to the Display section. The key is finding the settings that make you the most productive!

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Thursday Tip: Bump Up Your Icons

When CorelDRAW first arrived on the scene, most of us were still using screens that were only 640 x 480 pixels. Those pale in size to the monitors we are using today. 1024 x 768 is the absolute minimum to run the latest versions of CorelDRAW and many of us run on monitors with an even higher pixel count.

Just a few days ago I fired up CorelDRAW 3. Wow, things have certainly changed. The current versions have more icons to go along with the huge increase in productivity and functionality. With more icons, sometimes it is hard to find the one you need when working with the default icon size. I'm a huge fan of making them larger. Other users prefer to remove large numbers of icons that they won't use. This customization is one of the most powerful features of CorelDRAW and there is no reason that you can't use both of these methods. Delete the icons you don't need and increase the size of the rest.

While I won't go over all aspects of customizing the interface here, I will point you to where you can increase the size of the icons and from there you can explore other areas of customization. For complete details, there are a couple of chapters in my CorelDRAW X4 Unleashed book that spell it all out for you.

Select Tools | Customization to bring up the Options dialog box in the Customization section. Now click in the tree menu at left on Command Bars. This will show you a list of every command bar in CorelDRAW. Some will be checked meaning they are currently visible and some are uncheck meaning they aren't currently visible. I highly recommend that you do not change the icon size on the menu bar. Click on the entry under Menu Bar and then Shift + click on the last entry. This will highlight everything except the Menu Bar. Now change the button size to Medium or Large. If you are using CorelDRAW X3 or lower, I would recommend medium sized icons. CorelDRAW X4 added true large icons (older versions just stretch the medium icons) that look really nice. So if you have a large monitor, go for the large icons.

Of course this means your drawing page will be a bit smaller since the icons will fill more of the area around the drawing page. I think the tradeoff is worthwhile. Other users prefer to have the largest possible drawing area. There is no right or wrong answer here. Do what makes you the most productive!

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Thursday Tip: Keyboard Shortcut for Windows

Have you been good this year? If so, Santa just dropped off today's tip. He said the elves were a lot more productive when they were utilizing all of the keyboard shortcuts he dropped off.

First, let's find all of the shortcuts for CorelDRAW (or Corel PHOTO-PAINT). Select Tools | Options (that's Ctrl + J). Then navigate the tree on the left to Workspace | Customization | Commands. Click on the Shortcut Keys tab and then you'll see a View All button in the lower right of the dialog box. This allows you to print all of the shortcut keys or export them to a text file. The nice thing about this is that is allows you to customize the key and then print out the list of your own shortcuts.

While you may spend a lot of your time in CorelDRAW, you spend just as much time in Windows. Bill Gates wants you to have a productive 2009 as well. So he put together a long list of keyboard shortcuts you can use in most versions of Windows. After you get done playing with all of your new toys, see how many of these shortcut keys you can add to your arsenal.

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Thursday Tip: 50 Skills Every Real Geek Should Have

I don't know about you, but I certainly wear my geek badge with pride. Recently Maximum PC magazine did an article listing the 50 Skills Every Real Geek Should Have. Some of you can ace the test and others may be baffled. Believe me, I don't think anyone is going to know all 50 of the skills. You can take the "test" if you wish, but I'm sending you there because there are a lot of great tips embedded in those 50 skills. I still haven't worked my way through the entire list and have picked up lots of great information. I've also put a number of items onto my to-do list. Right near the top is to set up one of my USB Flash Drives to run many of my essential apps and that skill is right there on the list.

Do you have a skill that should be on the list? Leave a comment and maybe we can build our own list of skills!

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Thursday Tip: Creating a Cutline

Sometimes the most asked questions are somewhat baffling. Not it isn't that this tip is the easiest thing in the world to learn, it is just baffling that it is so often needed. Or at least it is one of those things that people ask me the most often.

Given a piece of vector artwork, how do you create a cutline around it? One of the key parts of the question is that we are dealing with vector artwork. If it is a bitmap, the answer is completely different and we can talk about that another day. First, select all of the vector objects and press the Boundary button on the Property Bar. Note that this button first appeared in CorelDRAW X3 so if you have an older version, now you know a good reason to upgrade. This gives you a line around the outside boundary of your objects. If there are inside areas you also need to cut, use the Smart Fill tool and click on each of those areas. Again, Smart Fill debuted in CorelDRAW X3 giving users of older versions yet another reason to upgrade. If you needed to use Smart Fill, select the outer boundary and all of the objects created with Smart Fill. Combine those objects and you have a cutline. Simply assign the color your device recognizes as a cut color and you're all set.

If you don't want the cutline exactly on the edge of the objects, use the Contour Effect to offset a new line just a bit from the original line. You can control the exact amount of the offset.

Now you have exactly what you need to create a cutline!

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Thursday Tip: Combining and Breaking Apart Text

When you think of the Combine (Ctrl + L) and Break Apart (Ctrl + K) commands in CorelDRAW, you typically think of graphic objects. One of the most powerful uses for these commands is when working with Artistic Text.

If you have several lines of Artistic Text and you use the Break Apart command, each line of text will become a separate object. Select one of those lines and Break Apart again and you'll find that each word is a separate object. Now choose one of those words and Break Apart once more to find that every letter is a separate object.

You can do just the opposite with Combine. Letters can be combined into words, words into lines of text and lines into "paragraphs." There is one big difference. When Combining, the order of selection is very important. Each of the pieces will be combined in the order they were selected.

I had a project come in yesterday where I receive a block of text in an e-mail. In order to format it as I desired, I had to use variations of these two commands. Sure, I could have re-typed everything but it would have taken much longer than using Ctrl + K and Ctrl + L a few times. Give this tip a try and I think you'll soon add it to your regular arsenal of tools!

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Thursday Tip: Web Safe Colors

There has long been a misconception that only a limited set of colors were "safe" on the Web. That just isn't the case, all RGB colors can be used on the Web. I've even seen mention that only Hex colors were Web safe. No, hexadecimal is simply another numbering system. In CorelDRAW, RGB values are shown in the decimal numbering system and range from 0-255. Hexadecimal represents those same numbers from 00-FF. There are a couple of tools that can help you use Hexadecimal numbers inside CorelDRAW. The first is Draw Color Helper and the other is wOxxOm Hex Color. Just remember to use RGB colors when designing for the Web and you'll be "safe".

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Thursday Tip: Space Bar Toggle

The Spacebar in CorelDRAW has always had a special meaning hidden beneath the surface. Pressing the Spacebar will switch between the currently selected tool and the Pick tool. If the Pick tool is selected, then the Spacebar switches back to the last used tool. Now things change a bit when the Text tool is selected. If you simply press the Spacebar, it gives you a space in your text. So use Ctrl + Spacebar to switch back to the Pick tool. You'll only need the Spacebar to get back to the Text tool.

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Thursday Tip: Changing Mask Marquee Color

When I'm working in Corel PHOTO-PAINT, I always turn off the Mask Overlay. Some uses love it and some hate it. It truly is a personal preference. To toggle it on and off, select Mask | Overlay. If you are like me and prefer to work with the overlay turned off, you'll see the Mask Marquee. Most people call this the "marching ants" as it appears to be a bunch of ants marching around the selected area. The default marquee is black and I sometimes find it hard to distinguish between the black ants for masks and the blue ants for objects, especially when they are on top of an image. So I select Tools | Options | Workspace | Display and change the Mask Marqee to red. Ah, much better!

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Thursday Tip: Use the Navigator

Often you'll find yourself zoomed in on a drawing in CorelDRAW and you need to move to another area. Or possibly you are working with a digital image with a high pixel count in Corel PHOTO-PAINT. In either instance, you need to use the Navigator.

Where the scrollbars meet at the bottom right of your drawing window is a white square. Click on it and a thumbnail of your entire illustration/image will be shown. Drag the viewing box around on the thumbnail and the screen will update accordingly. Finding it too difficult to locate that little white box to click on? Heck, just press the N key and the thumbnail will pop up right next to your cursor! There isn't a day that goes by where I don't use this very handy tool.

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Thursday Tip: Insert Symbol Character Docker

There has been confusion about this Docker since Corel introduced Symbols in CorelDRAW 12. Many users still think of Symbols as the simple graphics contained in symbol fonts. To bring up the Docker, press Ctrl + F11. Not only will you see symbol fonts listed, but every single font available to CorelDRAW. Just yesterday I needed to insert the bullet character and couldn't remember the keystroke for the character. I just brought up the Docker and dragged it into the block of text.

Some users don't want to see all fonts. They just want the symbol fonts. Not a problem. Just right-click directly on the font name at the top of the Docker and you'll get a pop-up menu showing which type of fonts are included. Uncheck the two "Fonts" choices and you'll be left seeing only the symbol fonts.

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Thursday Tip: Compose Your Photos

There are a number of ways that we can improve photos once they come into the computer. But to really improve the pictures, you need to do better when taking the pictures. Before you push the button, stop and think a bit about what would make the best image.

For example, you should compose your photos. If you are taking pictures of children, kneel down so the camera is on the same level as the subjects. In fact, you'll often want to try shooting the pictures from a different angle than just standing and shooting. Also look at what is surrounding the subjects of your photos. Is there a big sign growing out of the back of someone's head? Move everyone around so that doesn't happen. Are you shooting into the sun? If so, the picture will probably look pretty bad. Just a little bit of thinking before you push the button can yield much better photos.

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Thursday Tip: Quick and Dirty Screen Captures

In a given year, I do well over a thousand screen captures to use in my training materials. There are several very good utilities on the market to assist in this area. Probably the most comprehensive is TechSmith's SnagIt. Corel includes the Corel CAPTURE utility in the CorelDRAW Graphics Suite and it is a very powerful tool. I have both of those tools and yet I never use them.

If you want to capture the current screen, just press the PrntScrn key on your keyboard. That copies the screen to the clipboard. I then switch to Corel PHOTO-PAINT and select File | New From Clipboard to paste the image into PHOTO-PAINT and save to whatever format I desire. Hint, that is never JPG. I always use TIF or PNG. To capture only the current window, use Alt + PrntScrn. Sure, these shortcuts can't do everything. Yet I still haven't opened either of those other two applications in the last year. You might just find that you don't need a separate application either.

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Thursday Tip: Erasing Parts of Lines While Drawing

Have you ever made a mistake when drawing a line? I think we all have. That's where today's tip can save you some time and trouble.

When you are drawing with the Freehand tool (F5) in CorelDRAW, hold down the Shift key and go backwards over the part of the line you don't want and it will disappear. When you release the Shift key, you can continue drawing from where the erasing stopped.

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Thursday Tip: The Digger Tool

Go ahead and look through your CorelDRAW toolbox. Did you find the Digger tool? I'm sure you didn't because it is a tool that is well hidden. Funny thing is that it is very good for selecting hidden objects in your drawing.

I can't tell you which version first had the Digger tool. My best guess is CorelDRAW 11. So if you are using an older version and this tip doesn't work, I won't be surprised. In order to use the Digger tool, you'll need to have an object hiding behind another object. No, it isn't completely required that it is hidden. That just helps you to see how it works.

As you know, you can't click on an object if it is behind another object since you will end up selecting the top object. That's where the Digger Tool comes in to play. Hold down the Alt key and click again. Now you've selected the next object down in the stacking order. Alt + click again and it will go one more level down in the stacking order. This makes it very easy to select hidden objects. And since the Digger tool isn't really a tool, it is a feature that can be well hidden. It is nothing but an extension of the Pick tool.

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