CorelDraw Graphics Suite by Daniel Jolley

I have to admit that I’ve bad-mouthed Corel more than once in my life, especially back before my employer saw the light and dumped WordPerfect Suite for Microsoft Office, but I have nothing but praise for CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X4. Not only is this an impressive, powerful suite of graphics design tools, Corel doesn’t throw you under the bus as soon as you install the software. If you’re like me and don’t have a single artistic bone in your body (I can’t draw a straight line with a ruler), you would expect a fancy-pants software package like this to leave you dumbfounded from the start, with no clue on how to get started. Much to their credit, Corel throws you lifelines as soon as you jump in the pool and makes a diverse set of rescue resources near at hand for you at all times. I’m not saying you’ll be a graphics design guru after a couple of hours - this is a really advanced, powerful set of programs here - but you would have a hard time finding a piece of software with more impressive built-in support. The first of several excellent video tutorials is available on the Welcome screen, and you can choose to have a built-in docket of usage tips available for every function you choose. Users of previous versions of the software will have no problem recognizing the changes this upgrade brings with it, as you can choose to have every single change and addition from your previous version highlighted on the screen. That doesn’t sound like much, but it is a big help. You also have What’s New and Learning Tools readily available to you from the Welcome screen as well as from inside each of the featured programs. Of course, you also have a complete help file available but you won’t need to resort to using that very often.

As I’m sure you can tell by the price, you don’t buy this program if you just want to take the redeye out of your vacation photos or create a cute little Christmas card to send to friends. You can certainly do those things with this, but Corel Photo-Paint X4, impressive as it is, is overshadowed by the primary CorelDRAW application. (If all you want is a powerful photo editor, I would still recommend Fireworks - my favorite - or Photoshop.) I would like to have seen a few more built-in templates included, but CorelDRAW actually succeeds in making graphics design possible for even artistically inept folks like me. This is one powerful program which actual graphics professionals should take to like fish to water. Professionals may be the primary target audience for this software package, but Corel does a great job of making these powerful tools available and actually useable by anyone.

I also have to mention several additional software applications and features included in this suite deal. Corel PowerTRACE X4 is of enormous help in turning traced bitmaps into images you can convert into editable vector images. Corel CAPTURE X4, as you might guess, is a powerful screen capture utility. The Bitstream Font Navigator is a comprehensive font manager that even helps you identity scanned fonts from an outside source. You even get a Duplexing Wizard to aid you in optimizing the appearance of your document when printing two-sided copies. Vista users will also welcome the integration of this software package with the Vista operating system, as the search and preview options by themselves should be of great convenience to them.

What about file formats and the age-old question of compatibility? After all, the odds are that some if not many of your associates are working with different file formats in non-Corel software. Well, Corel has worked to make CorelDRAW Graphic Suite X4 software as compatible as possible with other users and systems. In this release, the list of additional new formats includes Word and Publisher 2007, AutoCAD DXF and AutoCAD DWG, and Adobe CS3.

I could go on writing paragraph after paragraph about this product, but I could never begin to describe all of its many impressive features. Is it the best graphics design software on the market? I don’t know, as I have no experience using any comparable graphics design programs. Even if I had, I don’t think anyone short of a professional graphics designer would be able to judge the comparative pros and cons. What I do know is that anyone who is serious about graphics design in any of its various facets would do well to give CorelDRAW Graphic Suite X4 a long and serious look.