Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: amigasociety on March 21, 2011, 07:43:15 AM
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I have a Relec Red One computer on the way to me with Amiga OS 4.1 and am new to Amiga OS 4 and have very limited knowledge of older Amiga.
I have a need to design a product and company logo and would like to give a whack at this using my Amiga when the time comes. Can someone tell me what OS 4.1 compatible apps are available that could be used for creating company and product logos.
Once created, what is the common format that these files can be saved in so they can be transferred to other platforms and printers?
Thanks, TJ
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ImageFX and Aladdin 4D come to mind. Candy Factory is another cool application.
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I would highly recommend not to waste your time with trying to do this with Amiga (this goes to all amigoid platforms, not just AmigaOS4). The proper tools for creating vectorized gfx just aren't there.
My motto is: Use the proper tool for the job.
In this case it'd be a mac or a windows box with proper software, such as Adobe Illustrator.
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The Amiga's best parallels to Illustrator are probably Art Expression and Draw Studio, both of which are 68K programs. Seeing as it's been 10+ years since they've been updated, don't expect Illustrator-like results.
PageStream might be a bit better, but it's a layout program with some illustration tools, rather than an illustration program.
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I guess this depends on how profesional you want to get. The Amiga is quite outdated for quality vector tools.
If you want very profesional you aught to use Illustrator for vector drawing, and max/maya/lightwave for rendering 3D logo's.
If your on a budget then inkscape and blender will do the job (both free).
If you must go amiga, then use what the guys have mentioned below. Don't use ImageFX, it's a pixel tool, and unsuited to logo work (apart from one off's that you won't need to scale).
Don't forget you can run some older Mac stuff under emulation. I used to do this back when I was studying graphic design, but could not afford a MAc classic. Photoshop, illustrator, free hand and quark can all be ran this way (much older version though).
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Gimp works fine under AmiCygnix & so does Blender natively (though Blender has a high learning curve for beginners). Lightwave 68k perhaps ?
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Gimp works fine under AmiCygnix & so does Blender natively (though Blender has a high learning curve for beginners). Lightwave 68k perhaps ?
There is also DrawStudio 2.0....which is about as good as Vector graphics apps got on the Amiga. However, even it is very old. PageStream is still being updated, and has some good vector drawing features, but as said above, it is a desktop publishing app with vector graphics thrown in - not as its strong suite.
You CAN get it done on the Amiga as long as your willing to put up with some bugs and frustration dealing with old software.
Or you can just download InkScape for free (opensource) for Linux or Windows (or Mac?) and do it on that without any hassle. Believe me I'm the kind of person that likes to use the Amiga if I can, but Inkscape is much more up to date.
Using the Amiga might be worth a try as long as you don't have a deadline. Oh, and don't use a bitmap image program to design logos. Logos should be scaleable. (well there are some programs that will intelligently convert bitmaps to vectors, but it's better to design the logo as a vector graphic).
I think the main problem if you design a Vector graphic on the Amiga will be exporting it to a commonly readable format for the client or a printing bureau to use. The Amiga used something like D2DR (or similar) and could often export to Encapsulated Postscript as well - but I've often found that the EPS graphics exported by Amiga vector apps are not quite "right" - i.e. they won't load (or won't load properly) into applications by other manufacturers.
You could try setting up a virtual Postscript printer (with Ghostscript?) and print to a Postscript file. I've never really done this but it might work.
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I guess you could try AmiFig. It's not too bad for a structured drawing/vector art program, and it's been updated more recently than any of the old 68k software. It's available for OS4, Aros and an older version for MorphOS. You can download it here: http://www.os4depot.net/index.php?function=showfile&file=graphics/edit/amifig.lha
Although I don't know how well you would go exporting graphics to another platform, but at least it's free so it's worth a try!
Here is a demonstration of the OS4 version:
[YOUTUBE]6fIW_6YZiJ8[/YOUTUBE]
And a demonstration of the Aros version:
[YOUTUBE]fjq8ct5d5IY[/YOUTUBE]