Canvas 6.0

by ACD Systems

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 6 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00002S79J
• Item model number: F9312-000-EN
• Date first available at Amazon.com: May 10, 2002
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #32,393 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

From Winmag®

In its sixth iteration, Canvas is a mature standalone graphics application that skillfully integrates its separate components, including raster-image editing, vector illustration, text layout, Web graphics production and a huge clip-art library. Competing products, such as Micrografx Graphics Suite, aren't nearly as adept when it comes to integrating and coordinating their separate components. The basic difference is that Canvas 6 has all commands available at all times, while similar programs require you to switch modes-such as activating paint or pixel graphics when in vector-graphics mode, for example.

Getting started
I found Canvas 6 easy to install, but it was a bit difficult to get started working with it. At first, I found it frustrating to use Canvas, as I discovered that even simple features, such as selection tools, have a wide range of options depending on whether you're working with vector graphics, raster graphics or text. Eventually I got used to the slightly odd interface; it took me an hour or two to get to work.

However, you may not get used to some of the program's performance limitations. While Canvas is a superb illustration program, a good image editor and a good text layout program, it doesn't always perform more advanced functions in some areas. For example, you can link a graphic object to a text phrase so that the graphic in the document is automatically updated whenever the linked graphic is changed. However, you can't link numbered sections or chapters so that they're automatically renumbered if one is deleted. This function is available in full-power desktop publishing programs, such as Adobe's PageMaker and Quark's QuarkXPress.

Still, Canvas is very flexible in other ways. For instance, it imports and exports a wide range of graphics formats, including unusual formats such as Adobe PDF and AutoCAD DXF.

The net result is that Canvas has a steep learning curve, but is able to perform 90% of what anyone would want, all within one program. Deneba is doing its best to alleviate the difficulty of getting started by including an introductory video with the program.

Tools to toy with
The best new feature in Canvas 6 is its SpriteLayer technology. This allows you to apply a different object type or group as a mask and transparency map for other objects-text, vector graphics or raster graphics. For example, you could apply a transparency map on a mask for the casing of a PC, so that the edges of the casing appear solid but the middle is transparent, revealing an underlying layer that shows the PC's insides-its motherboard, hard drive and so on. In the screenshot above, we've applied a transparency map to reveal the veins underneath the hand's skin.

The new transparency effects made possible by SpriteLayer include a full range of opacity levels and transfer modes, such as multiply or lighten. Transparencies can also have a gradient, and any other objects, including photos, can be used as transparency masks. You can apply these effects across layers and with all the varying data types, allowing a bitmap of the outside of the PC to be used as a mask on the case sidewalls to make them partially translucent.

Canvas also has a new guide layer to help you align objects, and it has added fillets to its CAD repertoire to make precise round corners. In addition, the program provides more feedback about every object and even provides numerical edit fields for quick calculations.

One of the neatest new tools is the knife, which slices through illustration layers. You can also flow text along multiple paths, use multiple master pages in a publication, spell check and use AutoCorrect for typing. And you can save pages to Deneba's Colada tool for direct viewing on the Web using a Java applet.

Finally, Canvas has improved its performance, with redraws occurring up to 30% faster than in the previous version we tested.

A new contender
All of these improvements-superior feature integration and a strengthened feature set-build a strong case for adding Canvas 6 to our WinList. In addition, $375 for an illustration program, desktop publisher, image editor and graphic design tool is a bargain. Canvas 6's price and its range of tools combine to earn it a place on our WinList.

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Deneba has done what Adobe has refused to do: unify graphics apps. This conglomeration mixes every metaphor a designer might ever conceivably need, but versatility comes at a price. Just as a sofabed rarely satisfies completely as either sofa or bed, Canvas 6.0 has a few rough spots.

From the top, Canvas 6.0 is: a vector-based illustration, raster-based image-editing, technical CAD/CAM drawing, 3D-graphics, page-layout, presentation, and web-design jack-of-all-trades. Amazingly, it wears all these hats smartly.

Spotlighted with version 6 is the SpriteLayer. This allows designers to layer, blend, and composite not just raster images, but also vector graphics and unconverted text. Now all these diverse flavors of elements can be manipulated in a single document in a single pass. The SpriteLayer's transparency effects are reminiscent of the latest version of FreeHand. But now type, line art, and continuous-tone imagery can all have varying degrees of transparency applied.

As an image-editing app, Canvas 6.0 accepted all the Photoshop- compatible plug-ins we threw at it. And familiar tools such as dodge and burn, clone, smudge, and blur are in effect, as are all filters and controls. Photoshop Acquire modules also work with 6.0, so getting images into the program shouldn't be a problem. And with this year's model, Canvas preserves layers when importing Photoshop files.

But don't mistake Canvas for Photoshop, which was our 1998 Graphics App of the Year. Deneba's implementation lacks the grace of Adobe's knowing touch. For example, Canvas 6.0 doesn't include a zoom-in preview for filter effects.

If you want extruded 3D type, look no further. Though primitive, this handy effect lets you customize your light-source color and position (although we'd like a focal-length adjustment for extreme perspective). And these can be applied to extruded and lathed 3D shapes based on your vector graphics, as well.

The vector abilities are very robust. Canvas has all the tools you'd expect of an illustration app, with bonus widgets thrown in for fun. Plus, any combination of attributes can be pasted from one object to another, and object-attribute style sheets can be created that streamline workflow significantly.

The more powerful drawing tools elevate Canvas into a rudimentary CAD/CAM app. Scale can be set for mechanical drawing, and dimensions for objects can be entered numerically. Special dimensioning tools let you measure and label any part of your schematic, and a SmartMouse feature constrains mouse movement in 12 user-definable ways. This feature takes half the challenge out of basic CAD.

In addition to these mainstay uses, Canvas 6.0 includes web tools (see sidebar), page-layout abilities that include support for CMYK separations (with full trapping preview), multipage documents, auto text flow in columns, and a customizable spell-check dictionary. Did we mention that the program also comes with 30,000 clip art pictures, 2,450 fonts, and a 30-minute video? But this breadth has drawbacks. Canvas 6.0's deeply nested tear-off tool bar is rife with unfamiliar (and sometimes downright bizarre) icons. And the lack of a true Layers palette makes managing all the diverse elements of more complex documents into a nightmare.

Still, none of this holds back this program's do-it-all attitude, especially at a price less than half that of the household names in graphics apps. Canvas 6.0's unique ability to combine disciplines will lead the designer down previously inaccessible creative paths. - Brad Dosland

Bringing together all the graphics app genres, Canvas 6.0 is the most lovable mutt since Benji.

Rating: 8/10

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