The End of FreeHand?

“Adobe Systems Incorporated and Macromedia, Inc. today announced they have either received or been notified they will receive all regulatory clearances necessary to complete Adobe’s pending acquisition of Macromedia. The companies expect to close the transaction on December 3, 2005.” – Source: Gondor News

Does this mean the end of Freehand?

Almost since the beginning of the Macintosh, Aldus delivered an application software package that made the lowly Mac Plus and the Mac SE super productive for illustrators and draftsmen. This was, of course, FreeHand. A seminal 2D illustration app.

And also, almost from the beginning of FreeHand, there was the clunky, buggy, unstable Adobe Illustrator software app to rival FreeHand.

(Yeah, you might detect *some* bias here, on my part)

Actually, I think it is how us graphics people have their brains wired. For me, FreeHand was created by someone who got into the neurons of my brain and built an illustration package around them. Other designers have claimed the same thing for Illustrator. (but we know how *they* think, don’t we?)

I was totally productive in a deadline intensive graphics house using FreeHand. And that was on a lowly 25 Hertz Macintosh SE. Man, it Rocked! I could make that puppy tap dance, using FreeHand.

We tested it daily in our office. The contest was between me on the Mac and a couple of equally excellent and professonal illustrators using technical pens and ink, on high end drafting boards. I won hands down every day. Nothing was as fast for production output than FreeHand.

FreeHand was used for everything. Technical manuals. Exploded Parts Breakdowns. Isometrics. Blueprints. Floor Plans and Elevations. Wiring Diagrams. Nothing could top it for exacting output on plotter or laserprinter.

Of course, being a job shopper at these graphics houses in the Eighties, there were other illustrators who used and swore by Adobe’s Illustrator (cough, cough).

Illustrator was a software app I loathed. Still do. It is not intuitive, nor is it faster or more productive than someone using a drafting board, turning out plans and illustrations in a production environment. (Probably because of all the crashes and lost data that is common to Adobe Illustrator)

Illustrator never rivaled FreeHand in speed and productivity (OK. your mileage *may* vary).

But, this seminal app that made the Mac a solid player in the Graphics field (and made people like me a lot of cash) is about to be history. Adobe buying the current owners of FreeHand will not wish it to be around to rival their (lousy, rotten, inept) Illustrator. No way. No how.

So if you own FreeHand, count yourself blessed in Mac-dom. If you don’t, buy a copy soon, from Macromedia, or from some college bookstore, or off EBay. Copies of this most excellent software program are going to be very rare, very soon. Which means that illustrators and graphics artists everywhere will have to go back to the drawing boards. At least there they will be more productive, than if they were using (%#&%@!) Adobe Illustrator.

What? Canvas? Corel Draw? Nope. Never used those kiddy toy apps. Sorry.

What do I use today? Maya. LightWave. People want 3D models instead of static plans. Once the model is built, you can take a snapshot of any part of it, including IPBs and 2D plan views. However, these 3D apps are no where near as easy to use or as fast as the old FreeHand was.

That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.

Regards,
Roger Born