Canvas X: Ten Times the Versatility of Your Average Graphics Tool A Graphics Designer's Dream Tool? Scott Koegler
Whether you perform most of your graphic editing in bitmaps or vectors, ACD's Canvas X (version 10) can handle the job and more. In fact, if you've been using a basic image editor and have outgrown its capabilities, Canvas is a great place to start looking to expand what you can do with your images and presentations.
Most graphics applications work with a particular type of graphic file. For example, Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, PhotoImpact, and Microsoft Photo editor handle bitmap files but can't touch vector-based images. In the same way, Adobe Illustrator does a great job working with vector images but is limited in its ability to edit bitmap images. The same specializations extend to the way different programs work with page layouts and presentations.
Canvas X, on the other hand, crosses these boundaries and more while keeping its overall price reasonable at just under $250. (And if you're upgrading from a previous edition of the software, you may qualify for an additional discount of up to $150.)
Canvas X is a great fit for mixed platform environments because it installs and runs on both Windows and Mac computers from a single distribution, and the program's interface is identical regardless of the operating system used. We installed the program on an Intel P-4 1.3Ghz running Windows XP Pro from the single CD. A DVD is included in the package and contains a library of images, clip art, and backgrounds for use in your designs. There's also a large collection of fonts in both TrueType and Postscript formats for PC and Mac on the DVD.
Once installed, Canvas' interface is refreshingly different. The familiar floating tool palette is available for quickly selecting the program's various pointing functions, and in keeping with Canvas' overall design, each tool selection expands to display its sub-tools. For example, selecting the Paintbrush tool displays its various optional settings. This design feature makes finding and using the right tools quick and simple, while also keeping the overall layout from being too cluttered and confusing.
We found Canvas to be relatively quick to master compared to the time it took us to initially get up to speed with Adobe's Photoshop. One reason for this difference is that functions, settings, and tools are displayed in the main workspace and change in context with the particular task setting in effect.
As an example, when working with a photographic image, the top information bar shows size, opacity, cropping, filters, and other basic functions. These change to reflect the available settings for each tool selected. For example, the pointer tool displays controls that affect the entire image, while the paintbrush tool only shows options pertinent to the size and stroke of the brush.
Canvas X is a document-oriented application, which makes it inherently different from most image editors that work on individual images and consider pages something to deal with later, if at all. Page orientation lets Canvas combine images in a document while providing extensive editing capabilities within both the image and the document at the same time — all without the need to change programs.
As an example, we created a multi-page document using Canvas' Presentation mode and its default formatting. While there were few options in the default template, we were able to make presentation-wide changes in the master slide that affected all the slides. Placing text boxes, images, and effects is similar to performing the same functions in PowerPoint, but because of Canvas' image editing capabilities, there is a dramatic difference in the amount of image editing that can be done directly within the slide.
