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Subject:RE: What graphics tasks do you perform? From:Nancy Allison <maker -at- verizon -dot- net> To:techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com Date:Tue, 19 Feb 2013 15:13:22 -0600 (CST)
Tony's hit on an important theme when he said:
"But as for general purpose software, GIMP is great for bitmaps, and
Inkscape is my go to vector tool."
I'm reviewing a book about GIMP, but I realize it's not the go-to tool
for everything. I won't try to review it for every purpose we have. I'm
assuming that tech writers use tools in roughly this way, if they have
the budget and the freedom to do what they want:
1. For photos: PhotoShop, Corel (PaintShopPro), GIMP (which is FREE!!)
2. For screenshots: SnagIt and similar utilities, or alt-Prt Scr with a
tool of choice such as Paint, PaintShopPro, etc.
3. Line drawings: Adobe Illustrator and similar programs
4. Flow charts: Visio if at all possible
I assume I should focus on the chief use of GIMP, which would be
handling photos. I assume it's huge overkill for editing a line
drawing, for example, which you could manage pretty well in Paint.
Please let me know which tools you use for which purposes. If you've
struggled with PhotoShop, what effects were you trying to achieve? I'll
find out how to replicate them in GIMP.
--Nancy
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