Some thoughts about FreeHand

Richard Hubbard, an avid supporter of FreeHand, maintains a blog on FreeHand. In the past, Richard has interviewed myself and some folks from Adobe as well. Today, Richard posted an interview with myself and also one with Terry Hemphill (Adobe Illustrator Product Marketing Manager). It's a good read and offers some good information and advice.

ASK MORDY: Aligning Anchor Points in CS3

I pulled this anonymous question from a comment on a previous post here:

In CS3, when you try to align points, let's say u have a ragged line made with the pencil tool (of let's say 5 points), and then you want to align the points and select all of them with the white arrow tool, how does AI know if you want to align the points between themselves or the whole object relative to another one? I mean, when all nodes are selected, can Illustrator tell if u have selected the object or just all of its nodes? I've been told FH was able to tell the difference.

Illustrator CS3 introduced the ability to align individual anchor points using the functions found in the Align panel (or the Control panel). This question actually bring about something which appears to have somewhat changed in Illustrator CS3 from CS2. Or if it isn't a change in actual behavior (meaning that it did happen in CS2), it's something that we have visibility to that wasn't present in the past.

First, it's important to understand what the Align functions do. When you select several objects and choose to align them, Illustrator treats each of those objects as individual entities. However, you'll notice that if you select several groups, the Align panel will treat each group as an individual entity. Which is why you can't align objects that are within a group when you simply select the group (as the group is treated as one object). To align the objects in a group, you can of course, double click on the group to isolate it. Then perform the align, then double-click to exit the isolation. Of course, you can also use the Direct Selection tool to select a few elements within a group, and you can align those. But if you use the Direct Selection tool to select ALL of the elements within the group, the Align functions realize that you have a group selected. And once again, it's treated as a single object.

Now think of each anchor point within a single object as if they were individual elements in a group. As long as you have SOME of the anchor points selected (meaning, not all of them), then Illustrator allows you to align those points. But as soon as you select all of the point on a path, the Align functions don't see the anchor points anymore -- they see the single path (again, think of the group).

I've noticed that in Illustrator CS2, when you select just a few anchor points on a path, the Control panel lists the Path as being the target. But now in CS3, when you have just a few anchor points of a path selected, the Control panel lists "Anchor Point" as the target. Apparently, that's how the context-sensitive Control panel knows to display all the new convert, handles, and anchor functions.



So you would need to select all anchor point except one, perform the align, then select that last anchor point that was left out, shift click on any other anchor point, and then repeat the align to get what you want. It's important to select the anchor points in that order. You already know that to align to a specific object, you click on a key object once you've made your selection. Well, with anchor points, clicking on an anchor point after it was selected will deselect all other anchor points. So Illustrator uses the LAST anchor point you selected as its "key" anchor point.

With regards to FreeHand, yes, this is far easier to do there. That's because FreeHand has the ability to select all of the anchor points in an object without selecting the entire object itself. For example, if you marquee select your entire object with the pointer, the anchor points become selected, and you can align all of the anchor points in the object. Click on the path with the Pointer and the entire object becomes selected, and will align as a single object. I believe my good friend JET likes to refer to this as FreeHand's ability to select anchor points and paths individually, where with Illustrator, they seem to be one and the same.

Illustrator is just "standard"

In today's world, we often spend much of our time comparing things, or trying to figure out who is best. In my home town (especially this coming weekend), the news is filled with Mets vs Yankees. Today's local newspaper dedicated two full pages to a position by position comparison of both teams, and who had the edge for each one. TV is filled with things like American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, and more. In the design community, we've spent years comparing Apple to Microsoft, Adobe to Macromedia, Syquest to Bernoulli, Type 1 to TrueType, PageMaker to Quark, Quark to InDesign, etc.

The latest "drama" to unfold is Adobe's announcement earlier this week, finally putting an end to the one thing that most people probably already knew anyway, but just didn't want to accept -- that FreeHand would not see another version.

While FreeHand users have never been silent in the past, when John Nack posted Adobe's intentions on his blog, FreeHand users once again have stepped up to defend their beloved program.

I do agree (quite strongly I might add) with one of John's statements. In response to those who claim Adobe "killed" FreeHand, John replies:

Well, you can blame Adobe, but not in the way you think: FH steadily lost market share to Illustrator, and Macromedia realized that rather than fight that uphill battle, they'd be better off funding other efforts. As far as I can tell, the FH codebase had been essentially dormant for 2.5 years before Adobe took ownership. So, blame Illustrator for surpassing FH in the market, leading to the current situation, but don't blame Adobe for not reviving a dormant app.

The reality is that Macromedia killed FreeHand way before Adobe even had the chance to do so. In fact, if I remember correctly, when I came on board as product manager for Illustrator in early 2001, FreeHand had 14% marketshare worldwide. At the time, I no longer considered FreeHand even as a competitor anymore, and instead saw older versions of Illustrator as competition instead (many users stuck with Illustrator 8 because of how fast it was and because it didn't have "transparency" issues at the time).

But as I mentioned before, we live in a world where we feel the need to compare things. And so, it's easy to say that FreeHand is better at this, or that Illustrator is better at that. There's no question that FreeHand has some great functionality, and that Adobe simply MUST consider moving much of that functionality over to Illustrator. But that's a discussion we can have at a different time. At present, I thought I'd take a different stand -- something which I think is more productive in the present -- because it can help users NOW (not in some unnamed versions in the future).

The reality is that many users are making a decision (either willfully or not) to make the move from FreeHand to Illustrator. While there are a handful of resources available to help people make that adjustment (some developed by yours truly), I thought I'd present five specific features that appear in Illustrator that have no equal (or aren't present at all) in FreeHand. In fact, I'll tell you that I rely on these five features quite heavily. And while I may miss a feature here or a feature there from FreeHand (I was a FreeHand user before I moved to Illustrator), the time lost because those features are not in Illustrator pale in comparison to how much time I now save because these five features are present in Illustrator today.

To make a point, I have chosen five features that are specifically NOT new in Illustrator CS3. The features I list here have been in Illustrator for at least two versions now, so I've come to rely on them heavily and can't possibly ever imagine giving them up for anything else -- even paste inside :)

To make an additional point, I've found that these specific features share an interesting theme -- as they are all build around standards. Standards are important, and most designers I know have to deal with many kinds of files with many kinds of demands and with many kinds of deadlines. And Adobe's commitment to standards throughout Illustrator (and all of it's other programs for that matter), have only helped me in my work.

While you can argue that it's easier to select objects in FreeHand, these are five things that I do in Illustrator many many times each day, and ultimately save more time in the end.

PDF

While it was only a few years ago that I was pulling matchprint proofs, color keys, and dye-sub prints for my clients, today it's all about PDF. And while I fondly remember the days of racing across the city to drop my camera-ready ad for a newspaper to the latest Fed-Ex drop off in the city, I don't even think twice now when I send my files via email or upload them to a printer's FTP site (remember trying to jam just one more Syquest cartridge into that fedex envelope?).

The reality is that Illustrator's support of PDF and the standards built on it (PDF/X) are something I simply could not live without. Whether I'm sending a quick proof to a client or creating a high-res PDF for press, I can rely on using Illustrator for that. And since Illustrator can also OPEN any PDF file, I have the ability to edit or use content that I once might have had to redraw on my own from scratch.

I create so many PDF files each day, and while you can certainly create PDF from FreeHand, you don't have NEAR the robust support that you would have in FreeHand. That's why support for the PDF standard is reason number one for why I can't look back.

OpenType

It wasn't pretty for Illustrator users when CS came around with its brand-new text engine. Migrating older files to the new version was painful, and for workflows that demanded moving files between CS and non-CS versions, a nightmare ensued. But there's no arguing that the modern Unicode-based text engine in Illustrator has made a world of difference in the work I do today. Better language support, better global support, and most importantly, better cross-platform support, means that files that I create can be used around the world, and likewise I can use files from almost anywhere.

I have clients with office around the world, and who need to create documents that people can read anywhere on any device. And Adobe support for the OpenType standard means that I can deliver that promise. It also means that I can incorporate the creative advantages of OpenType into my work. I used to spend my day trying to get documents with crazy fonts to work across multiple machines in my own offices and in my client's offices around the world. And I can't begin to explain how often I'd be on the phone with a client who claimed their PDF contained all these boxes on their screen where text was supposed to appear, when the file obviously looked perfectly fine on my screen. I can't go back there -- and so OpenType support (and Illustrator's professional-level typography in general) is reason number two for why I am not looking in the rear view mirror, but have my eyes firmly locked on the road ahead.

XMP

I'll admit that when Adobe first announced their support for the XMP standard, I thought it would only be interesting for huge businesses or news agencies (like the Associated Press). But here I am, publishing content and creating new files every day. My hard drive is filled with files that I create or update every day. And I work with others. And they have their hundreds and thousands of files. Metadata becomes increasingly more important.

On my own, I have also found myself publishing files and posting them for others to benefit from. With XMP I can store copyright information in my files. I can provide information above and beyond the content that appears within the file itself. And XMP metadata enables much more in the way of scripting, integration with digital asset management systems, and products like Adobe's Version Cue and the Adobe Stock Photos service. These days, I can't afford not to have this information, and probably couldn't function without XMP in most of my files. This is why XMP is reason number three (it rhymes).

Integration

So this is admittedly a broad category. I originally meant to label it as integration with the industry-standard application for photographic editing -- Adobe Photoshop. But then again, Illustrator is a best-of-class citizen when it comes to integration with almost all of the programs I use on a day to day basis. Illustrator has always excelled here, and besides for the ability to export layered PSD files with many items intact (layers, editable text, opacity, clipping masks, slices, etc.), you can of course also bring layered content with all that goodness from Photoshop back into Illustrator as well. Add After Effects to the list here, as I use that often enough. I am also holding back from mentioning Flash here -- only because Illustrator to Flash workflows were never pretty until CS3 came along (although in CS3, Illustrator to Flash integration is probably the best example of cross-product integration that I've ever seen between ANY product -- with the possible lone exception of the Dynamic Link feature found between After Effects and Premiere Pro).

I use so many applications every day and work on so many projects that I can't see limiting myself to trying to force one application to do it all. I use whatever I can have available to me at the time to get my work done, and Illustrator enables that. I can't imagine using anything else. Chalk integration up as the fourth reason for my loyalty to Illustrator.

Save for Web

I'm trying to think of a feature I use more often than Save for Web in Illustrator (it has been renamed Save for Web & Devices in CS3). I also could never believe that FreeHand never moved to offer this kind of functionality. In the world we live in today, I'm repurposing graphics all the time. Nothing gives me near the functionality that Save for Web does. One can argue that you can do all of that stuff in Photoshop, but the whole point is that I can get it done so quickly in Illustrator directly.

And it goes beyond just saving out a GIF or a JPEG here and there for a website. Clients need logos that appear in their proprietary database programs, wallpaper for their cell phones, icons for their digital displays in their windows, etc. I also use Save for Web to quickly crank out art for screenshots or for posting illustrations on my blog. Or for generating still frames for podcasts, movie clips, or animations. It's a workhorse, and it does SWF animations too. How can you beat that? A part of me died inside when Adobe lopped off ImageReady (the actual codebase for Save for Web), but for most of what I need on a daily basis, I need Save for Web. And that's reason number five.

It's official: No new versions of FreeHand.

I think that we've all known this deep inside for quite some time now, but finally, Adobe has made their decision known about the future of FreeHand.

Adobe does not plan to develop and deliver any new feature-based releases of FreeHand. Adobe will, however, continue to sell FreeHand MX, and will offer technical and customer support according to our support policies.

Adobe further states:

While we recognize that FreeHand has a dedicated user base, we encourage you to migrate to Adobe© Illustrator© CS3. As a loyal FreeHand customer, you’re entitled to special pricing for Illustrator CS3, along with free access to special resources to help you make this move.

Adobe's special upgrade pricing for FreeHand users is $199 US (and all English versions). It's 199 EU for the International English version, 249 EU for localized versions, and is 24,762 YEN in Japan.

To be even more clear, Adobe said it has no plans to provide maintenance releases, patches or updates for FreeHand MX, nor any plans to deliver native Intel-Mac or Vista versions either.

Adobe is offering assistance for users making the move from FreeHand to Illustrator by offering a variety of resources in the way of documents and videos, which are available at www.adobe.com/illustrator/switch.

My own opinion is that I'm glad Adobe has finally spoken about this. Adobe did a huge disservice in my opinion, by avoiding any word on this issue for so long, making it difficult for both individual users and large organizations to decide on how to proceed. Yes, the writing was always on the wall, but as most anyone will tell you -- not knowing is a lot worse than knowing.

That being said, I'm happy that Adobe took the first step by starting to add some FreeHand-like features to Illustrator in the recent release of CS3. I can only hope that they will continue to do that in future versions.

Full details from Adobe here.

FreeHand Keyboard Shortcuts for Illustrator CS2

Most applications have the ability to redefine keyboard shortcuts. Meaning, if there's a certain feature that you use often, but there's no keyboard shortcut for it, you can very easily choose Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts (in AI, PS and ID for example), and assign one for that feature. In fact, if you scroll towards the bottom of the list of Menu Commands, you'll find that you can even assign keyboard shortcuts to some items that don't appear in menus at all.

And since it might be bad to mess up your keyboard shortcuts, you have the ability to save your own customized sets of keyboard shortcuts. In fact, InDesign ships with a keyboard shortcut set for QuarkXPress users. If you've just made the switch to InDesign and you are still used to all of the Quark shortcuts, you can switch to the keyboard shortcut set for Quark. This way, all of your familiar Quark shortcuts work in InDesign.

My personal opinion is that if you also use other Adobe apps, using a Quark set of shortcuts in InDesign isn't that much of a help in the long term. However, I do see value in the short term, when users first make the switch, to use familiar shortcuts as a "crutch" to prevent frustration and to help build familiarity in the new application. When I made the switch from Quark to InDesign, I used the Quark shortcuts for several days before I abandoned them for the (mostly) consistent set of shortcuts across all Adobe applications.

But I always did wonder why Adobe never supplied a FreeHand set of shortcuts for Illustrator. I made the switch from FreeHand to Illustrator way before Illustrator had the ability to assign custom keyboard shortcuts. But I know that at the time that I made the move, it would have helped to have that crutch to lean on.

So with that in mind, I've gone ahead and created a FreeHand MX set of shortcuts that you can load into Illustrator CS2. If you're a FreeHand user who recently made the transition to Illustrator (or if you're currently evaluating Illustrator CS2), feel free to download this file.

Once you've downloaded and unzipped the file, drop the file into the following folder on your computer (the file is cross-platform):

Windows:
C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Adobe\Adobe Illustrator CS2 Settings

Mac OS X:
username > Library > Preferences > Adobe Illustrator CS2 Settings

Then relaunch Illustrator, choose Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts and choose FreeHand MX from the Set pop-up menu.