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Xara 3D 6.0 Sat Jan 05, 2008 7:24 am
djvito
Admin
An improved interface, new design options, better
integration and sheer speed make Xara 3D a pleasure to work with – but
its range is strictly limited..
Xara, the company behind Xara 3D, is the developer of Xara X 1 the most
efficient, creative and affordable 2D drawing package available. The
same focus on speed, productivity, usability, creativity and value is
apparent in the company’s 3D offering, Xara 3D.
But it’s important to keep things in perspective. At just $45 you can’t
expect a full 3D modeler and you certainly don’t get one. Instead Xara
3D concentrates almost exclusively on handling 3D text. When you create
a new file, it automatically appears with dummy text in place. Once
you’ve replaced this with your own, Xara 3D’s speed becomes apparent by
the interactivity it enables. You simply drag to reposition your text,
shadows and lighting within 3D space, fully rendered and in real time.
And now you can drag to manage the depth of extrusion and bevel too.
This hands-on approach makes the whole process of creative
experimentation intuitive and enjoyable, but you can’t make all edits
directly on your graphic. Previously, other settings such as the choice
of bevel type (there are now no less than 27 on offer), were handled
via a series of idiosyncratic and ugly docker panels, but the interface
has been completely reworked. Now the redesigned Option Bars – Colour,
Extrude, Design, Bevels, Shadow, Texture and Animation – are all neatly
docked down the right of the screen and are selected in turn by
clicking on their title. It’s a lot neater and more streamlined than
version 5, but it does mean that you are now limited to having just one
Option Bar open at a time unless you undock them.
Apart from the new interface, the other immediately noticeable change
is that the default 3D text is now surrounded by a default 3D oval
border. This is part of a general move to incorporate a shape with your
text to create a combined design. Beside the basic standalone text,
there are four new options to choose from - Button, Board, Board with
Holes and the new default, Border – depending on whether the text is
flat on the object, embossed on it, drilled through it or surrounded by
it. As you’d expect with Xara 3D as soon as you select an option the
document window updates instantly and, as you have exactly the same
formatting control over your object as you do for your text, you’ll be
producing striking logos or web buttons in no time.
Xara 3D 6 provides the most common and useful object shapes – rounded
rectangles, ovals and so on – from a dropdown in the new Design Options
Bar or, using the Design Picker you can choose from a number of more
advanced options – spheres, crosses, splats and so on. You can also
load your own files in XAR, WEB, WMF or EMF format and, when you
register, Xara provides a free copy of its Webster 2 application (as
sold for $49) to help you create them. Much the most convenient option
is available to Xara X 1 users who can now simply copy and paste their
vector shapes into Xara 3D. Even better, you can also copy and paste
your 3D designs back into Xara X 1. The results look excellent – right
down to partially transparent shadows – though this is only possible
because the 3D object is pasted as a rasterized bitmap.
Once you’ve got your basic design looking the way you want it, you can
bring it to life with the Animation Options Bar. Again this provides
the most common options from a dropdown – rotate, fade, pulsate – while
more advanced options – combined effects, individual character
animation and so on – are available from the Animation Picker. There’s
no keyframing capability so effectively you’re stuck with the preset
animations on offer but there’s no question that these can be striking
- particularly now when many of the animations involve different
effects for the text and object. Especially impressive is the way that
Xara 3D lets you interactively reposition text, object, shadows and
lighting and even resize bevels and extrusions as the animation is
playing onscreen!
Ultimately of course your 3D design or animation isn’t much use within
Xara 3D itself so the final production stage is to export it. Xara 3D
supports output to all the main web bitmap standards - JPEG, GIF, PNG
and animated GIF - as well as to BMP format. Particularly impressive,
especially at the price, is the program’s support for vector Flash SWF
output although shadows and textures are automatically dropped and you
can expect some pretty enormous file sizes depending on your choice of
bevel.
For video-based output the choice is simple: AVI. However, with this
latest release you can now choose any codec that you have installed on
your system such as Cinepak or MPEG-4. This provides much greater
flexibility and efficiency, but it does mean that, if you’re planning
on distributing your AVI, the end user will need to have the same codec
installed on their system for playback. You can also save your
animation as a SCR screen saver though, as these are based on embedded
AVI, the same advice regarding distribution applies.
When exporting animations to AVI format, you can now specify any installed codec.
3D by its nature is a demanding field but, with its simple approach,
Xara 3D makes it child’s play to produce impressive results. Its range
is strictly limited to logos, titles, shapes and buttons, but for many
users this clear focus will be seen as another advantage.
System Requirements: Pentium 500 MHz or higher, 64/128MB of RAM , 50MB
of hard disk space, Windows 98, Me, 2000 (SP2) or XP, 16-bit display
Download :
integration and sheer speed make Xara 3D a pleasure to work with – but
its range is strictly limited..
Xara, the company behind Xara 3D, is the developer of Xara X 1 the most
efficient, creative and affordable 2D drawing package available. The
same focus on speed, productivity, usability, creativity and value is
apparent in the company’s 3D offering, Xara 3D.
But it’s important to keep things in perspective. At just $45 you can’t
expect a full 3D modeler and you certainly don’t get one. Instead Xara
3D concentrates almost exclusively on handling 3D text. When you create
a new file, it automatically appears with dummy text in place. Once
you’ve replaced this with your own, Xara 3D’s speed becomes apparent by
the interactivity it enables. You simply drag to reposition your text,
shadows and lighting within 3D space, fully rendered and in real time.
And now you can drag to manage the depth of extrusion and bevel too.
This hands-on approach makes the whole process of creative
experimentation intuitive and enjoyable, but you can’t make all edits
directly on your graphic. Previously, other settings such as the choice
of bevel type (there are now no less than 27 on offer), were handled
via a series of idiosyncratic and ugly docker panels, but the interface
has been completely reworked. Now the redesigned Option Bars – Colour,
Extrude, Design, Bevels, Shadow, Texture and Animation – are all neatly
docked down the right of the screen and are selected in turn by
clicking on their title. It’s a lot neater and more streamlined than
version 5, but it does mean that you are now limited to having just one
Option Bar open at a time unless you undock them.
Apart from the new interface, the other immediately noticeable change
is that the default 3D text is now surrounded by a default 3D oval
border. This is part of a general move to incorporate a shape with your
text to create a combined design. Beside the basic standalone text,
there are four new options to choose from - Button, Board, Board with
Holes and the new default, Border – depending on whether the text is
flat on the object, embossed on it, drilled through it or surrounded by
it. As you’d expect with Xara 3D as soon as you select an option the
document window updates instantly and, as you have exactly the same
formatting control over your object as you do for your text, you’ll be
producing striking logos or web buttons in no time.
Xara 3D 6 provides the most common and useful object shapes – rounded
rectangles, ovals and so on – from a dropdown in the new Design Options
Bar or, using the Design Picker you can choose from a number of more
advanced options – spheres, crosses, splats and so on. You can also
load your own files in XAR, WEB, WMF or EMF format and, when you
register, Xara provides a free copy of its Webster 2 application (as
sold for $49) to help you create them. Much the most convenient option
is available to Xara X 1 users who can now simply copy and paste their
vector shapes into Xara 3D. Even better, you can also copy and paste
your 3D designs back into Xara X 1. The results look excellent – right
down to partially transparent shadows – though this is only possible
because the 3D object is pasted as a rasterized bitmap.
Once you’ve got your basic design looking the way you want it, you can
bring it to life with the Animation Options Bar. Again this provides
the most common options from a dropdown – rotate, fade, pulsate – while
more advanced options – combined effects, individual character
animation and so on – are available from the Animation Picker. There’s
no keyframing capability so effectively you’re stuck with the preset
animations on offer but there’s no question that these can be striking
- particularly now when many of the animations involve different
effects for the text and object. Especially impressive is the way that
Xara 3D lets you interactively reposition text, object, shadows and
lighting and even resize bevels and extrusions as the animation is
playing onscreen!
Ultimately of course your 3D design or animation isn’t much use within
Xara 3D itself so the final production stage is to export it. Xara 3D
supports output to all the main web bitmap standards - JPEG, GIF, PNG
and animated GIF - as well as to BMP format. Particularly impressive,
especially at the price, is the program’s support for vector Flash SWF
output although shadows and textures are automatically dropped and you
can expect some pretty enormous file sizes depending on your choice of
bevel.
For video-based output the choice is simple: AVI. However, with this
latest release you can now choose any codec that you have installed on
your system such as Cinepak or MPEG-4. This provides much greater
flexibility and efficiency, but it does mean that, if you’re planning
on distributing your AVI, the end user will need to have the same codec
installed on their system for playback. You can also save your
animation as a SCR screen saver though, as these are based on embedded
AVI, the same advice regarding distribution applies.
When exporting animations to AVI format, you can now specify any installed codec.
3D by its nature is a demanding field but, with its simple approach,
Xara 3D makes it child’s play to produce impressive results. Its range
is strictly limited to logos, titles, shapes and buttons, but for many
users this clear focus will be seen as another advantage.
System Requirements: Pentium 500 MHz or higher, 64/128MB of RAM , 50MB
of hard disk space, Windows 98, Me, 2000 (SP2) or XP, 16-bit display
Download :
- Kod:
[color=Blue]http://rapidshare.com/files/72077618/XARA3D.rar[/color]
