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© 2004 by Rick Altman. All Rights Reserved.
IN SOME WAYS, the cause for celebration has nothing to do with the merits of the brand new version 12 of the CorelDraw Graphics Suite.
It has more to do with the fact that it’s here at all.
After all, most of 2003 amounted to a near-death experience for the entire company, let alone the software. Given the uneven resources, paltry budgets, and sky-is-falling scenarios shadowing the development team, it is a small miracle that CorelDraw users are seeing any sort of new release. Instead, this month, they will see a pretty darned good one.
This reviewer is on record many times over about Corel’s best chance at profitability and CorelDraw’s best direction toward success. Instead of chasing the Adobe windmill, the belief here is that Corel should court the business graphics user who is saddled with the deficient tools in Microsoft Office. (We refer you here for the details of our argument.) Version 12 represents answered prayers in this department, with a concerted and a fruitful effort to turn Draw and Paint into accomplished partners with Office.
The new marquee player in this performance is an export engine that promises and delivers quality graphics in forms that Office users can appreciate: clean vectors to Word and Excel, and accurate images to PowerPoint. In testing this, we went right to the holy grail—transparent graphics created with CorelDraw lenses—and were instantly impressed. Figure 1 shows the dramatic improvement between Versions 11 and 12, using an extremely demanding assignment that has historically resulted in guaranteed disappointment. Whether you use the new Export for Office wizard that now appears on the File menu or go the traditional route through the Export dialog, the new Masked Image choice for transparency is the key.
This provides a level of capability for accomplished PowerPoint users that is wholly unprecedented. No other program supports transparent graphics in PowerPoint as deftly as Draw 12.
If cozying up to Office users seems very Windows-like, then this
next piece of news will come as no surprise: Corel is giving up
on the Macintosh platform and releasing version 12 only under Windows
XP, 2000, and Windows Tablet PC. Windows 98 users will need to finally
make the move in order to upgrade to 12.
The various other improvements to the flagship product run the gamut from humbug to ho-hum to holy mackerel. A sampling...
Opening a drawing that contains text in a language different from yours usually results in display problems. Now you can change the language encoding to change the character set.
You can display dynamic guides to help you precisely position, align, and draw objects relative to other objects. Dynamic guides are temporary guides you can pull from the following snap points in objects — center, node, quadrant, and text baseline. This, along with a new setting in the Align and Distribute dialog box, makes the alignment shown in Figure 2 simple.
Drawing becomes even more idiot-proof, now that freehand strokes can be recognized and converted to basic shapes. The Smart drawing tool can be set for maximum recognition and smoothness, allowing Figure 3 to be more than just an object of your fantasy.
You can use the enhanced Eyedropper and Paintbucket tools to copy much more than just a color now. You can snag just about any property from one object and pour it into another, as Figure 4 shows.
Symbols have seen some nice evolution, including a local and a
network-wide linking scheme. They are still buried in the Edit menu
for largely inexplicable reasons. Thank the heavens for Customize...
If you are waiting on version 12 to deliver the more anticipated items on the PhotoPaint wish list, you will be disappointed. There are precious few Paint-only features added; in fact, only one: the Touch-up brush tool allows you to remove flaws in an image by blending its textures and colors.
Otherwise, improvements to Paint come in two flavors: suite-wide
improvements and bug-fixes. Paint gets to enjoy the new Export to
Office intelligence as well as the multiple language support. We
notice smoother operation with Batch Process and a general increase
in peppiness.
The third iteration of Rave inherits all of the new features discussed above with Draw and brings the promise of better operation with sprites. Our tests confirm that various combinations of objects and effects that previously caused bad output definitely behave better in Rave 3 (the one in the new version 12 suite).
However, In the all-important question of file-size, Flash files from Rave 3 are within 10 bytes of those created in the previous version. This will remain the bain of existence for Rave users, who together make up a loyal but beleaguered lot. The notion of being able to use a CorelDraw-like interface to create Flash files is very attractive, and Rave doesn’t really have to get too much better than it is today in order to satisfy many of those who seek it out. But bloated file size and under-developed features continue to leave these promises more empty than fulfilled. Too bad...Corel could cultivate a whole new group of users with this product if it could only evolve it a bit.
We polled the user community through much of January, asking anyone who would listen to share with us their pain. We received long letters, sample files, and lengthy diatribes about version 11 frustrations and not-so-veiled pleadings for 12 to be better—almost as if we were the ones who had anything to do with that. (And indeed, a few of them wanted to shoot the messenger when we couldn’t give them encouraging news.) Here is a sampling...
Douglas McFarland writes: “I want to see the copy/paste bug fixed whereby you can only copy from page 1 of a .CDR file and paste it into Paint. Anything from other pages does not work.
Indeed, version 11 pastes empty objects into Paint that come from
any page of a .cdr file other than Page 1. Version 12 has fixed
this: objects paste into Paint correctly from any page of a CorelDraw
file.
Marie Lomas wants the Gaussian Blur command in version 12 to work as it used to, instead of the flawed way it does in version 11.
Marie’s wish is CorelDraw 12’s command—see Figure
5.
Peter R. shares a popular sentiment: I really wish the anti-aliasing was improved in Draw. I'm tired of cropping a pixel or two border off my images because the edges get anti-aliased.
Alas, the news here is bad. Draw still anti-aliases straight lines,
requiring a time-consuming, tedious, and frustrating trip to Paint
to remove the unwanted edge color. This is the most prominent issue
that prevents Draw from being compared with its Macromedia and Adobe
counterparts for web graphics.
Roland Honda asks about Workspace bugs and why only the Customize portion of the Workspace pages actually get saved.
Ask no longer—that has been fixed. Every element within Workspace
at Tools | Options now is saved with one’s workspace. Furthermore,
when version 12 starts for the first time, it finds version 11 workspaces
and offers
to import them. Furthermore, workspaces that would create instability
in 11 import and behave much more reliably in 12.
Odysseus wrote: I would like to see the ability to input coordinates for individual nodes and control points. I find having to create a pair of intersecting guides in order to specify the position of a point very tedious.
Odysseus will be happy with the new Dynamic Guides, as he will
have better control over all elements, including nodes. You can
set up snap points for nodes and get excellent tactile feedback.
Jo Schaper asks for better filename control: Web Export to GIF or JPG in 11 results in upper case extensions, not lower case. I have to go back and change them all.
Fixed in 12.
Jerry Carpenter bemoans the fact that his imported AutoCAD files take forever to ungroup. He sent us a 1MB file .dwg file that required almost a minute to ungroup in Draw 11.
We imported it into Draw 12 and ungrouped
it in under 8.5 seconds.
Phil Sampson writes in from the U.K. with two wishes: If you have your cursor in a piece of text and then go directly to the one-shot zoom tool and zoom in, objects underneath the text get moved when you drag your marquee. This is a horrible glitch. Also, in version 11, the Pantone palette has a problem in that you can no longer just type the PMS number you want into the colour name box. It used to work in earlier editions but doesn't in 11.
Version 12 will be batting .500 with Mr. Sampson. Hunting for Pantone
colors is now fully operational, but the dreadful problem with objects
moving with the Zoom tool still persists. If you have your text
cursor placed, you should not attempt a marquee zoom. Instead, use
the hotkeys or switch to the Pick tool first.
Bob Arnold and Peter Clifton both lament the de-evolution of the Convert Outline to Object command in version 11 and hopes that it is improved in 12.
Happy campers these two will become—vive la difference!
Many of us in the beta-testing community (those who help Corel by using the software during development) are still stinging from the spanking that our credibility received back in late 2002. You might remember: we reported with glee about how stable version 11 was. This was based on the last version that we saw before it was sent to manufacturing, and we thought it was the final version.
But it wasn’t, and somehow that nice clean code became the oft-unstable product that many of you suffered through for much of 2003. Some of us are still wiping the egg of our faces.
So why should you believe us now? All we can say is that if we are wrong about this one, it’s on our heads, not Corel’s: this review is based entirely on the actual product that was sent to manufacturing. And this product has not yet crashed, over a period of about two weeks, with two versions each of Draw, Paint, and Rave running. The Export to Office feature performs as delivered, the new snaps and guidelines are nice, and a few dozen warts were removed. All in all, it will not take long for this reviewer to bid farewell to version 11 forever.
Paint and Rave users will have nothing to write home about, except that their products are still around. Again, six months ago, that was no sure thing...
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RELEASE: Available in English, German, French, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese and Japanese in mid-February 2004.
PRICING: Suggested retail pricing in the U.S., $399; upgrade, $179. Upgrade eligibility from practically any graphic program that is sold under Windows.
To discuss CorelDraw 12 or this review of it, please head to our Forum.
To see it in action, join us for our Spring Seminar Series.
Copyright 2004, All rights reserved. Have an opinion? Share it with the Corel community at the CorelWORLD Forum. There is already quite a bit of discussion about this story. Join in.
May 2007: As simple as possible, but not simpler... · April 2007: Killer Keystrokes · March 2007: Resolution Confusion · January 2007: Fearless Forecasts for 2007 · November 2006: Epiphanies at PowerPoint Live 2006 · August 2006: Escaping Death by PowerPoint · July 2006: Notes from the Floor of InfoComm · June 2006: Beyond PowerPoint--Making Movies for Business and Pleasure, Part II · May 2006: Beyond PowerPoint--From Photos to DVDs · April 2006: It’s Your Music!--Overcoming the oppressive restrictions of iTunes · March 2006: CorelDraw X3—A few must-haves and a few missed opportunities, all in all, a credible upgrade · February 2006: Making Windows Inhabitable · January 2006: Fearless Forecasts for 2006 · September 2005: Just What is a Background Anyway? · August 2005: Meet David Dobson, Corel's New CEO · July 2005: Community, Blind Dates. and Albert Einstein: An Interview with the PowerPoint Live Conference Host · June 2005: CorelWorld 2005: Image Editors, Executive Appearances, and Krispy Kremes · May 2005: As Adobe's Shadow Grows, Is Corel Better off or Worse? · March 2005: Delivering Your Presentation: How Close to the Source Can You Get? · February 2005: Digital Photography: The Killer App of this Generation Part II · January 2005: Digital Photography: The Killer App of this Generation · November 2004: A Killer Deal for Corel Or Another Distraction? · September 2004: The Scourge that is Kazaa and AOL Instant Messenger · August 2004: The Golden Triangle: Presenter, Audience, and Slides · July 2004: A Blast from the Past: How Fast is Fast Enough? · June 2004: Guilty Pleasures · May 2004: A Personal Wish List for PowerPoint 12 · April 2004: Eyedropping: Version 12 makes a good tool even better... · March 2004: Deadly Sins Of Modern PowerPoint Usage · February 2004: Is the even-numbered curse finally over? · January 2004: Another take on Achieving Absence of Ugliness · November 2003: What can we do it again??--Debut of PowerPoint Live Leaves Unquenchable Thirst with the Host · September 2003: Corel Corp. Has a New Custodian · July 2003: Candor and Contrition at CorelWORLD · June 2003: What a Long, Great Trip It’s Been! · May 2003: The Boat that Corel is Missing · April 2003: No Fooling...Is Corel Breaking Up? · March 2003: The Annual Design-a-Brochure Contest · February 2003: Symbolism is Everything · January 2003: Mania, Our Semi-Annual Pilgrimage to Holland · October 2002: On Creativity, Problem-Solving, and Paper Bags · July 2002: CorelDRAW 11: Surprise, Surprise... · May 2002: The Sound of Silence: What does it mean when a company plays its cards so close to its chest? · April 2002: The Art and Science of Presentation Graphics--Creating for the Screen Has its own Challenges · March 2002: CorelDRAW 11: What kind of personality and attitude should a software program have today? · February 2002: Oy, my aching fingers... · December 2001: Digital Photography · November 2001: Can we say goodbye to the Rolls Royce Mentality? · October 2001: An Unforgettable Week: The drama that unfolded around CorelWORLD · August-September 2001: The Art of Paragraphics: New-age ingredients for success with Corel VENTURA · July 2001: Your Very Own Interface: How to make Corel applications read your mind · June 2001: Fighting the Font Wars: How to stay sane with your sans · May 2001--Turning the Key at Nicholas-Applegate · April 2001--A Modest Proposal for Reviving VENTURA Publisher
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