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22REVIEWSBitmapsIn addition to using a bitmap as anobject fill you can also insert bitmapobjects into your document, this isachieved by first loading the image intoDrawStudio and then placing it on thepage. This process is slightly more longwinded than other packages but it hasthe advantage that DrawStudio onlyloads an image once, regardless of howmany times that image is used in thedocument. All the common bitmapformats are supported for loading includingIFF, JPEG and TIFF. You can alsochoose to save any combination ofobjects or even a whole page as abitmap image for use in other programsor on a web page. If you’re saving in a24bit format such as IFF24 or JPEG youcan switch on the Antialiasing featurewhich smooths out the jaggies in curvedand diagonal lines when they are savedas a low resolution bitmap.FontsPostscript fonts are supported and thereis a built-in font manager which allowsyou to access fonts installed anywhereon your system, so DrawStudio canshare a common set of fonts with otherapplications. As PostScript fonts arescalable they produce perfect smoothoutput at any size, DrawStudio alsoallows you to convert a text object intoits component shapes so you canmanually edit the letters, idea for logos.Like any other object text can have itsown line and fill styles and you can alsoapply any of DrawStudio’s specialeffects. While the text support is ideal forprojects with a small amount of text youwouldn’t want to add large blocks of textto a DrawStudio document as there isno line wrap support (you must pressReturn at the end of each line) and eachblock of text must all be in the sameformat (you can’t make a single word ina paragraph bold or underlined for example).Another limitation is that youcannot import text from a file, everyword must be typed into a text box.Special EffectsA selection of special effect features canhelp jazz up your documents (althoughmost of them are best used sparingly!).The most flexible is the warp effectwhich can form the objects you selectinto a certain envelope. A variety of presetwarps are available in the Warprequester, some examples are perspective,arc and parallelogram. If you’refeeling adventurous you can make acustom warp by dragging four handlesaround the shape to create your ownenvelope. Text on a curve wraps anytext you select along a curve or arounda circle. There a plenty of options allowingyou to set the offset from the curveand how the text is sized to fit the availablespace, as usual a preview helpsyou make the right choices.OutputIn addition to saving bitmaps which arecompatible with almost any packageDrawStudio can save its output invarious structured formats. As youwould expect the native DrawStudioformat supports all the program’sfeatures including multiple pages andtransparencies however as far as I amaware no other programs are able toload or save this format. The other supportedformats are IFFD2RD and EPS.IFFD2RD is the standard Amiga structureddrawing format and is supportedby most other drawing and DTP programs,however it does not support allDawStudio’s features. EPS is in thesame boat on features support but it iscompatible with many recent programson the Amiga and other platforms, asEPS is a type of PostScript you can usethe PostScript display mode to checkexactly what will be saved. As onlyDrawStudio’s own format supports allthe programs you will probably need tosave as a bitmap at an appropriate resolutionto get the full effect into anotherpackage. Although this isn’t a majorproblem it is a pity that a powerful,widely supported, structured graphicsformat hasn’t appeared on the Amiga.TurboPrint, PostScript and preferencesprinter drivers are supported for printingfrom DrawStudio, of the three onlyTurboPrint will really do DrawStudiojustice by printing in full 24bit colour.The main DrawStudio window.ConsI can find very few negative things to sayabout DrawStudio, if I had to find onearea it would be that the interface canfeel a bit clumsy, in particular the wayyou have to open requesters to performmany functions. Most graphics and DTPprograms now use palettes so thesefunctions can remain available while youwork on different objects, making theirinterfaces feel more fluid.ConclusionDrawStudio is an extremely useful toolboth for creating images for use in otherapplications and for short, graphicallyoriented documents. I’ve found it particularlygood for projects where I wantto mix bitmap and structured elements,it’s here that those transparent effectsreally come into their own! You soonlearn the quirks of its interface and beginto enjoy the wealth of powerful features.It’s sad that a program of this calibre isno longer being developed however topmarks to Kickstart for publishing it againat an excellent price.ResultsProsPowerful, wide range of features.Excellent value for money.ConsInterface slightly old fashioned.No further development.CLUBBED - Issue 8KicksoftGraphicsDrawstudioThis excellent Graphics package avaliable one again!!Comes on CDand includes Texture Studio & Image Studio.£35.00Photogenics 5This excellent Graphics package by Paul Nolan. On CD.£70.00Image EngineerGreat Image manipulation program. Add effects to imagessuch as Jigsaw, Wave and Frame! Comes on CD.£25.00Candy Factory ProCreate 3D Text from any standard font and use them on webpages etc. Comes on CD.£35.00Art Effect 4Billed as “Photoshop® on the Amiga”. Excellent graphicpackage. Comes on CD.£75.00DTPPageStreamThe Premier DTP program on the Amiga©, enough said!!£169.00PageStream UpgradeThe Premier DTP program on the Amiga©. Upgrade fromversion 3, you will need to provide your serial number.£65.00MiscGoldEdThe best Editor, Program Editor, HTML Generator on theAmiga. Comes on CD.£30.00TaskiSMSSend Text Messages to mobile phones from your Amiga!Comes on CD.£12.00Spitfire 2If you have a 3com Palm© or compatible then you need thisprogram! Comes on CD.£25.00Directory Opus 5The best Workbench replacement program avaliable. Fullymultitasking, Filetype reconition and much more...£55.00If you don’t see what you want, just ask!Our range is always growing!PlayersMoovid PPCPPC version with both WARPUP and POWERUP versions.Comes on CD£18.00MoovidPlay AVI, Mov and QT files on your Amiga© Comes on CDand includes demo files.£12.00Frogger PPCPPC MPEG player. Comes on CDwith example MPEGs.£18.00Frogger68k MPEG player. Comes on CD with example MPEGs.£12.00RivaThe fastest 68k MPEG player on the Amiga! Comes on CDwith example MPEGs.£18.00SoftCinemaPPC AVI, QT and Mov player. On CD with example Movies.£18.00InternetInet DialHome server on your Amiga©. Comes on CD, includesApache and Geek Gadgets.£40.00AWebExcellent web browser Full Version. Comes on Floppy.£35.00AWeb UpgradeExcellent web Browser. Upgrade from OS 3.5 or OS 3.9.Comes on Floppy.£29.99UtilitiesProfessional File System 3The fastest and safest file system avaliable, upto 300 timesfaster than FFS. No longer get Validation errors!£35.00MetaviewThe best Clipart viewer on the Amiga©. Comes on CDwith30,000 clip art images.£18.00DiavoloThe best backup program on the Amiga©. Comes on Floppydisk.£50.00Add £1.00 UK postage per item. Make cheques payable to Kicksoft Ltd.Buy Online athttp://www.kicksoft.co.ukKicksoft Ltd.,30 Whitegate Way,Tadworth,Surrey, KT20 5NS(01737) 215432
REVIEWSREVIEWSWhen you load Photogenics for the firsttime the preferences window opensallowing you to select your desiredscreenmode, undo levels and GUIrelated options. Once you have savedyour settings Photogenics loads and displaysa “Tip of the day” window, thesetips are both useful and quite detailedhowever, if you really don’t like themthey can be disabled. Since the originalversion 4 release there have been lotsof minor improvements in the GUI suchas much clearer tabs in the tools window(labelled options) which are selectedautomatically when you move your pointerover them (this can be disabled)which can make operations much fasterbut takes some getting used to. Thetoolbar icons now “roll over” (get a 3Dlook) as your pointer moves over themand almost all gadgets have tool tips(pop up help bubbles) which appear ifyou hold your pointer over the for a fewseconds.The NGIO tab in the tools window whichshowed the savers and print modules inversion 4.x has been removed, saveformats can now be selected from awindow that opens when you selectsave as or the save icon on the toolbar.Printing seems to have disappeared!There is an icon on the toolbar but click-5ing it opens the save as window.......hmmmmm, lets hope this is oversight onPauls part (can we have our printing optionback please Paul). Some thingshave been added to the GUI, one of themost useful being the inspection tab,this shows a close up view of the imageunder the pointer, ideal for detailedwork. If you are zoomed in on theimage the inspection tab changes toshow the un-zoomed image so you cansee the overall effect of the changes youmake.PhotogenicsMick Sutton and Rpbert Williams look at the latest version of an old favourite.Photogenics for anyone who isn’taware is a 24 bit paint and imageprocessing package with aunique way of working, it allows you topaint on and off all manner of effectsand has a vast array of real world paintingtools making it ideal for experimentationand producing really artistic lookingresults!The minimum requirements are:68030 CPU8Mb RAMAmiga OS 3.0CD ROM drivebut you really need:50mhz 68060 CPUa 16 or 24bit display16Mb or more RAMSince Photogenics 4 was released in1999 it has gone through many minorupgrades each adding more featuresand improving stability. Version 5, thatwe are looking at here was released inMarch this year and is the first versionthat is available for multiple platforms(Amiga, Linux and Windows). Althoughthere are some major new features inversion 5 it is a fairly small upgrade fromthe last upgrade of version 4 (4.5), thejump in version number reflects themove to multi platform. The good newsThe new batch conversion window issimple and effective.The tips are really useful and onceyou’ve read them just switch them off!is that this upgrade is free to Amiga version4 owners!So what’s new since ourreview of version 4?Loading and SavingFile format support has been improvedthere are now loaders for Photoshop,PCD and a variety of common Unixformats. The PCD loader is particularlyuseful because it allows you to selectthe image resolution and orientationbefore loading, most of these formatswith the exception of PCD are also availableas savers. During the developmentof version 4 a new file format unique toPhotogenics was added, this supportsall Photogenics features so you cansave an image complete with layers andeffects. This is very useful indeed as itallows you to work on a complex imageover several sessions, and for those ofus that don’t get that perfect result firsttime there’s no need to stay up till 3 AMtill we get it right!Whilst on the subject of savers, a newsave for Internet window has beenadded, this shows you the effect on bothquality and file size of different JPEGand PNG quality settings. You areProduct InformationDeveloper: Paul NolanAvailable: from Kicksoft and otherdealers.Tel: +44 (0) 1737 219280WWW: www.paulnolan.comwww.kicksoft.co.ukPrice: $99 downloadable fromPaul’s website.£70 on CD fromKicksoft.shown before and after thumbnail of theimage and estimates of how long itwould take to download at variousmodem speeds.... wicked! GIF is still notsupported in the Amiga version,probably due to licensing issues.New EffectsSo what new image processing andpainting features are there in version 5then? Well for starters there’s the newtransparency and vignette tab in thetools window, these features allow youto set the overall transparency of thepaint layer in different ways. The transparencysection has sliders which varythe transparency based on aspects ofthe image such as the three primarycolours (RGB), shadows, midtones andhighlights, you can still paint on and offwith the mouse. This feature allows youto easily apply an effect to a particularpart of the image for example you coulduse it to lighten or darken shadow areas.Vignettes work in a similar way but limitthe effect to a border around the imagewhich can be rectangle, circle or oval,you can set the size of the border andhow it blends into the image, this is goodfor quickly “framing” photos (see examplescreenshot xx).The text feature has been vastly improvedin functionality and more importantlyease of use, you can now havemultiple text boxes on the image atonce, each with a different font and settingsif you should wish and all theboxes remain editable until you fix thelayer. Another fine feature is the antialiasingoptions which smooth out thejagged edges on text, and there arethree levels to choose from, low,medium and high. The text boxes themselveshave been improved with eightlarger sizing handles which makes themmuch easier to manipulate, thiswelcome improvement has also beenapplied to the crop tool, the single pixelhandles in version 4 were very frustratingindeed!A totally new feature is batch file conversion,selected from the project menu awindow with a simple source file list,destination, and file format selectionallows you to convert all the selectedfiles to any of Photogenics save formats.Two of the tool bar functions have beenenhanced, the move tool and the symmetrytool. You can now choose to movethe secondary image (the image that isused for rub through), the alpha channelor both together with the move tool, inLara Sutton demonstrates the vignette effect!addition to it’s old function of moving thelayer. The symmetry tool now has theoption to set the number of levels youwish to use, so now you can draw somevery complex kaleidoscopes!A few new paint modes have been introducedin version 5, but there have beenmany added since the original version 4,some of our favourites are bizarrepixelise which is a bit like lookingthrough a glass brick wall, honeycombwhich breaks the image up intohexagons, remove red eye (does what itsays on the tin), bumpmap produces afull colour emboss effect, star blur andplus blur. There are also a whole host ofrub-through options, which are handy asthis is how you composite images inPhotogenics.Perfect?There are a few improvements that wefeel could be made, probably the majorone is cleared layers management, currentlyPhotogenics has a pop out menuof layers which makes it difficult to tellwhere the current layer is in relation tothe others. It would be nice to see a separatelayers window with drag and dropsorting, name labels and icons to showhidden or visible layers (Art Effect 4 hasa window like this and we found it muchclearer). On some effects andoperations the progress bar does notseem to keep in time with what’sactually happening, sometimes leavingyou wondering wether something ishappening or if it’s hung! Another thingwe would like to see in future versions ismoving between text gadgets with theTab key as currently you have to use themouse to select each one. All thesegripes are minor and none of them impairthe use of the package.In summary Photogenics 5 is an excellentprogram and has come along inleaps and bounds since the initial version4 release, the fact that version 5 isa fairly small step from 4.5 is reflected inthe free upgrade. If you are at all interestedin graphics Photogenics is a musthave application it has an excellent mixtureof realistic painting tools and powerfuleffects all of which seem to run considerablyfaster than the competition, goon treat yourself!ResultsProsExcellent range of features andunique ways of using them.Upgrades have really improved it.Version 5 is a free upgrade.ConsLayers management not intuitive.GUI can be sluggish.24 CLUBBED - Issue 8Summer 200125
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