CorelDRAW Tutorials

CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X3 Advances to the Next Level
By Steve Bain

A peek under the hood of the CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X3 hints at a change in the wind at Corel. Two years of development and more rigorous testing have brought to the suite better reliability and performance along with the many new tools, effects, and advancements. But it's the quality woven into the very fabric of the suite that really caught my eye. Maybe, it's the subtle sophistication that comes with maturity. Take a look at what's new, and you'll see what I mean.

CorelDRAW X3's New and Improved Tools
CorelDRAW X3 boasts a myriad of new and improved Toolbox components. The new innovations include an ingenious new Smart Fill tool, a new bitmap-cropping tool, an overhauled star-drawing tool, and significant improvements to the Shape Tool.

The Smart Fill Tool doesn't just apply fill colors to shapes, it also creates the shapes. Just use the Property Bar options to choose your fill and outline colors and the outline width, and click an enclosed area where any two shapes overlap (as shown below). The result is a new shape that exactly matches the area you clicked. The Smart Fill Tool simultaneously performs a shaping command and applies new fill and outline colors to the new object.

The Crop Tool enables you to interactively redefine the rectangular boundaries of an existing bitmap. Just marquee-select the area you wish to preserve, and double-click to permanently eliminate the unwanted pixels (as shown below).

The Polygon Tool seen in previous versions has been split in two separate tools to make drawing stellated (star) shapes easier for experts and less mysterious for new users. The Star Tool now enables you to draw simplified star shapes (formerly created using the Star mode of the Polygon Tool). The Complex Star Tool enables you to create the more complex stars shapes previously drawn with the Polygon Tool (as shown below).

Shapes created with the Complex Star Tool now include glyph nodes for controlling the position of the outer points when editing their shape at the node level (see below).

The Shape Tool has been enhanced to provide improved interactive feedback when you're making node selections and while manipulating nodes and curve segments. When making node selections, a new Property Bar option now enables you to choose between Freehand or Rectangular selection modes (see below).

Vector editing is now easier and more intuitive thanks to the new Shape Tool onscreen feedback during node editing sessions. Nodes and curve markers now appear in blue, and curve handles now sport arrowhead shapes (see below), making them easier to differentiate from surrounding elements. These markers also appear while you're drawing curves with the Bezier Tool.

New Object-Shaping Commands

If you've ever tried to manually round or bevel the point where two straight lines join, you'll appreciate the three new shaping commands in CorelDRAW X3. You can now instantly apply symmetrical chamfering, filleting, or scalloping commands to objects. These corner-shaping effects can be applied to a specific radius value by using a new a docker (shown below), essentially eliminating the time-consuming workarounds needed to accomplish the same effect.

Chamfering enables you to apply inside rounding to straight corners, while filleting applies the inverse of this shaping effect (as shown below). Scalloping enables you to create a flattened-corner effect of a specific length.

You can apply these shape commands to all corners of an object selected by using the Pick Tool, or apply the effects only to specifically selected points by using the Shape Tool (see below)

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While we're on the subject of shaping, you'll also find an object cut-line/keyline command available in this version. The Create Boundary command enables you to create a new shape based on the enclosed area created by any overlapping shapes. You can access it from the Shaping portion of the Property Bar (shown below) or from the Object menu.

The new shape is closed and is based on your current fill and outline property defaults. The Create Boundary command can be applied to both vector and bitmap objects. In the illustration shown below, the Create Boundary command was applied to three overlapping rectangles to produce a new shape that precisely matches the outline of the selected overlapping shapes.

New Dynamic-Beveling Effects

Of all the new features, CorelDRAW X3's new dynamic Bevel effect is the only bitmap-based effect you'll see. This cleverly implemented new effect enables you to quickly create realistic-looking three- dimensional effects from flat two- dimensional shapes by way of a new Bevel docker (shown below).

Your object's current fill color serves as the basic color scheme for the effect, with options available for controlling the bevel offset, the shadow color, as well as lighting color, direction, intensity, and altitude options. The effects are dynamic, meaning they can be persistently editable and can be applied by using a flat Emboss style, or realistically by using a Soft Edge style (see below).

Improved Text Resources for Typographic Experts

Text-related tools and resources in both CorelDRAW X3 and Corel PHOTO-PAINT® X3 have been overhauled to include professional-level features sure to please both pundits and critics alike. The logistics behind text formatting is more clearly defined, and you can now insert coding for line and column breaks, and add professional-level hyphens, dashes, and spaces.

CorelDRAW X3 includes two re-engineered text dockers (see below) that supplement, rather than repeat, options found on the Property Bar when you format text.

The new Paragraph Formatting and Character Formatting dockers enable you to apply property changes at the object level by using the Pick Tool, or at the character level by using the Text Tool. As in other professional layout applications, the text docker properties in CorelDRAW X3 are logically organized by style type. Each option area in the dockers can expand or collapse, as needed. The choice of specific text options is menu-based (see below).

The dockers themselves are context-sensitive, which means that they display the current properties of the selected text object or character string. This subtle but important shift in docker operation means that the changes you apply to character or paragraph properties occur instantly - you don't have to click an Apply button as you would in other CorelDRAW dockers. Although the management of typographic properties in CorelDRAW has migrated through several different interface methods over the years, these redesigned dockers offer the smartest solution yet.

Typography professionals will certainly welcome the new special character-coding capabilities of CorelDRAW X3. By choosing Text > Insert Formatting Code, you can access commands for inserting special-function characters (see below). Adding these characters can improve the typographic readability of your designs. You can now control the size of spaces, dashes, and hyphens in text and limit the amount of text in a paragraph text frame. The new formatting codes in CorelDRAW X3 enable you to insert space characters, such as em, ¼-em, en, nonbreaking spaces, and column or frame breaks, into your text.

Advanced dash and hyphen formatting codes enable you to add em and en dashes, and nonbreaking or optional hyphens. You can insert any of the special formatting characters when you import text. You can also use shortcut keys for codes when typing an artistic or paragraph text string. You can also create your own lists of hyphenation exceptions by using the Custom Option Hyphens dialog (see below). Hyphenation can now be toggled on or off for specific text objects using command menus.

New Dynamic Text-to-Path Controls

If you create effects involving text applied to a path, you'll see how much more smoothly this effect can be applied with CorelDRAW X3. Manipulating text on a path is enormously easier, thanks to the new dynamic previewing capabilities.

You can adjust the text position on the path more easily and adjust the path offset interactively. The dynamic feedback shows you the new position of the character string measured to the text baseline position, and an on-screen display shows the precise text-to-path offset value (see below). By dragging the glyph node, you can access a crosshair pointer for controlling the text position on the path, and you can drag the text above or below the path to control the path offset.

The revamped text-to-path Property Bar (see below) also includes several new options. You can quickly mirror the text orientation by using the Mirror Horizontally option and/or Mirror Vertically option. You can also use and control the new Tick Snapping option, which enables you to specify snapping increments for offsets as you position the text in relation to the path.

Better Bullet Options

When it comes to structuring point-form text, you can more easily access and customize bullet effects for selected text. Although CorelDRAW has always enabled you to apply and format bullets, you now have more options and better access to this feature. Just choose Text > Bullets for access to the Bullets dialog (see below), independently of the Text Formatting dialog.

Using the Bullets dialog options, you can customize your bullet characters using any symbol font installed on your system. New options also enable you to automatically set the space between the bullet character and the first character in the string, eliminating the need to devise a tab character arrangement (see below).

Integrated Bitmap Tracing

You no longer need to launch a separate application to trace bitmap images into vectors. Corel's new PowerTRACE utility is now accessible from a single dialog launched from the Bitmap menu or the Bitmap portion of the Property Bar (as shown below).

PowerTRACE includes many of the features previously available in CorelTRACE, but also includes an impressive toolset for customizing and manipulating the colors of the newly traced vector shapes. PowerTRACE features six different tracing modes which provide varying degrees of tracing quality and accuracy. You can also apply a Quick Trace command that is applied almost instantly at basic settings, without opening the dialog.

The example shown below illustrates the tracing results of a digital photo traced by using the Quick Trace command, which generated just 76 objects.

Advanced Color Support

Although applying fill and outline overprints at the object level in CorelDRAW is nothing new, what's new is what you see when one color is set to overprint an underlying color (shown below). You can now choose Enhanced with Overprints (the default view setting) as a view mode to enable you to preview the overprints you manually apply to objects in your drawing.

Expanded Object Layer and Page Ordering

If you're accustomed to working on layers, you'll appreciate the added object ordering commands. You can now control the object layering either within a layer or within the page structure by using new Order commands (shown below). You can use command menus or keyboard shortcuts to quickly change the order of selected objects in relation to their current layer order, or within the page structure.

Recouped Object-Copy Handling Power

CorelDRAW X3 enables you to create copies of selected objects in many ways using a variety of techniques. Improvements in this area make locating the Duplicate offset options easier. The first time you use the Duplicate command (Ctrl+D), a dialog opens (as shown below) prompting you to set and/or confirm your current duplicate options.

The Clone command has returned to the default workspace of CorelDRAW X3 after an absence from last version. You can create a clone by choosing Edit > Clone, to establish a relationship between your clone and its master. The Select Master and Revert to Master commands are available via right- mouse button functionality.

A new Step and Repeat docker now enables you to create multiple copies of selected objects at specified offsets. To toggle display of the docker (shown below), choose Edit > Step and Repeat (Ctrl+Shift+D).

New and Improved Image-Manipulation Tools

A new fully-equipped Image Adjustment Lab (shown below) is now available in both CorelDRAW X3 and Corel PHOTO-PAINT X3, enabling you to quickly correct color and exposure flaws in digital images. This new lab enables you to correct images by creating snapshots of previewed settings for evaluation before making a selection. Adjust image properties manually by using the dialog sliders, or simply click Auto Adjust to apply instant corrections. Auto Adjust can also be applied via command menus without the need to open the dialog.

Revamped Photo-PAINT Cutout Lab

The beefed up Cutout Lab available in Corel PHOTO-PAINT X3 now enables you to fine- tune the defined areas you wish to isolate in an image and use new previewing, background, clip mask, and image- preserving options (as shown below).

New Spot Color and Alpha Channel Options
Corel PHOTO-PAINT X3 includes two new Channel docker options (shown below) for you to use when preparing and manipulating digital images. You may now create new alpha channels as an option from the Channels docker options menu. You may also create new spot color channels enabling you to preserve spot color information for color printing. The spot colors you add can be previewed as either opaque or transparent relative to other colors. Corel PHOTO-PAINT X3 images that include spot color channels can also be saved in PSD, DCS, PDF, or EPS file formats.

Integrated Raw Camera File Support

The CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X3 now includes Raw Shooter, an application that enables you to open and edit the image censor information stored by high-end digital cameras. Raw Shooter 2005 now supports file formats from various manufacturers, including NEF, CRW, DCR, ORF, and MRW.

Advanced PDF Publishing Power
When it comes to digitally publishing your CorelDRAW X3 or Corel PHOTO-PAINT X3 documents, you'll have access to the latest in security advancements. The improved Publish to PDF filter enables you to produce documents that can be viewed with Adobe® Acrobat® Reader® or viewed online with the Acrobat Reader browser plug-in. Although PDF publishing isn't new, the PDF Security options (see below) now enable you to protect the documents you create with passwords for opening, printing, editing, and copying the newly created PDF document.

When using PDF permissions, you can control if and when the document can be opened, edited, or printed. When a Document Open password is used to encrypt a PDF document, Acrobat Reader requires the password to be entered before the document can be viewed, copied, edited, and/or printed. Smarter Learning Resources

If you're a newcomer to CorelDRAW or Corel PHOTO-PAINT, you'll no doubt benefit from the new Hints docker (shown below). It provides task-based directions on how to use program tools and features. The Hints docker is also now context-sensitive, meaning it includes a live-update feature that displays information relevant to whatever tool or feature you select as you work.

A new Insights from the Experts feature links you to a series of project tutorials in PDF format written by well-known experts from the Corel community that guide you through strategies and techniques on how to tackle a wide variety of design projects.

If you're an experienced user who's upgrading, you can quickly get yourself up to speed on what's new and improved from specific past versions using the Highlight What's New. It activates color highlighting to indicated tools, menu commands, and Property Bar options new since previous versions (shown below).

We've really just scratched the surface of what's new and improved in the CorelDRAW X3 Graphics Suite. There are certainly more new features you'll want to explore on your own. In the coming months, we'll take a closer look at how you can benefit from many of the new tools and features in the suite.

Steve Bain is an award-winning illustrator and designer, and the author of nearly a dozen books, including CorelDRAW: The Official Guide.