Paolo Pace

February 2002.

Adobe avoided letting its fans down by releasing another superior upgrade to their power Illustrator series. To be fair I'd like to address the things I didn't like right off the bat before jumping into any praise.

What is up with their new tool icons? The new icon bar sports drop shadows and beveling making trusted old tools nearly unrecognizable, slowing down the work flow as I tried to reacquaint myself with tools I've been familiar with for years. Tossed in for good measure I noticed a line tool now makes an appearance, apparently for those newer and not so savvy people who didn't know what the pen tool was for. It seems Adobe has been reading one too many "Idiot Guides" and books "for Dummies" because the new interface looks like they think less of their users than ever before.

Also, as much as I love what the Web is becoming, Print is still a big part of my world and I'm not fond of the direction that Adobe is taking with their products. Despite the Internet playing such a predominant role in design lately, print production software still has a long way to go before being close to perfect. So Illustrator 10 fails a bit in my view simply because it leans too far over on the media side of things for my comfort. Besides, I've traditionally used Illustrator for my print jobs and Photoshop for my web work and it irks me to see image slicing taking up residence in Illustrator now. I would assume that this would be the first step that Adobe is taking away from ImageReady. On the bright side of things, now Illustrator lovers can turn their Illustrator work into symbols for efficient management of your work flow and transportation into Flash. Allow me to say, "It's about time!". This is certainly a step in the right direction and considering that Adobe has attempted their own move into the motion graphics industry it's amazing to see their willingness to consider the needs of professional designers above their need to compete with Macromedia!

Conveniently, there are additional tools that allow you to manipulate your symbols in such a way that you can alter you symbol's transparency and appearance, (color, style, etc.) which is pure genius!

On another note, not every designer is predominantly into Print as I am these days so to you others I announce good news! There is now integrated support for AppleScript, Visual Basic script and JavaScript. No more messing around back and forth trying to tidy up and replace data when Illustrator is prepped to help you out.

The magic wand is a sweet addition as well. Not your usual magic wand that you might be familiar with from other Adobe programs, such as Photoshop and ImageReady. This wand seeks out similar strokes, weight, fills, opacity and blending and auto selects other parts of your image that match your existing selection. If you've ever had to deal with complex Illustrator files that span several layers with complex shapes this new tool is going to blow your mind.

An odd new feature, that I feel has no place in the program, is the lens flare tool. It is found under the shape tools as the last selection and creates lens flare effects in vector format. Much like the new line tool I find this to be an unnecessary add-in. Perhaps Adobe is trying to appeal to a much broader range of experienced professionals but my advice is that if you need the line or lens flare tool you probably shouldn't be using Illustrator commercially until you learn more about it.

For those savvy Illustrator users, you know that when you need to alter the stroke or path of an image that you bring in the Convert Anchor Point tool. Well, apparently that must have been too hard for users because now there is an easier way to warp things. I'll let the images speak for themselves.

Still, Adobe has put forth another handy Illlustrator upgrade but words of warning here: make sure you have a stable and fast computer as it isn't light on the load.

Words for Adobe

After having taken a good long look at Illustrator 10 my overall impression is that this is still the leading software for industry professionals but they need to mind the over simplification! If Illustrator starts sporting tools specifically designed for users that aren't designers then they are likely to lose the actual professionals who count on Adobe to offer programs that provide sound tools for their design solutions.

This shouldn't a tool for design wannabes. For years I've trusted Adobe to understand the professional designer's needs and I've respected the way that they have listened to their customer base without patronizing. The beveled and drop shadowed tool icons, the line tool, the lens flare tool and other warping tools are a step in the wrong direction in my opinion and I'd like to see Adobe rein things in a little. More emphasis on print with an equal balance of web will keep Illustrator on top but there is no need to add features that other Adobe products already handle. What next, Illustrator video output? C'mon.

What's the overall buzz surrounding Illustrator 10? Data driven graphics. You'll hear the talk and if you pick up this upgrade you'll understand why.

You can try it out here: http://www.adobe.com/products/Illustrator/tryreg.html

Copyright 2002, Paolo Pace, All Rights Reserved