Hi, Newb with a software question

[Scamper]

Hi, I have been playing around with a wide format canon inkjet printer for a while as we have a business where I like to do my own posters etc.
Trouble is with inkjet is you can't get anything to last so found a cheap Roland vs300 and jumped on it.
We have been playing around with the basics with some demo copies of software and are about to purchase a genuine copy of Corel Draw graphics suite 2019.
This was available in our budget (we are not planning on making a big business of this)
Question is, do you guys think this will work fine for what we want as the machine is old and we are using Versaworks 5.5
We will be using it mainly for printing shop signage, stickers and maybe some race car wraps for people we know that race speedway.

I have been searching through the forums for weeks and found a lot of info, but it seems there are so many options that no two answers are ever the same. Also have been spending hours on you tube learning.
But before I go through hours of learning corel draw, I figured I would get the experts opinions.
Regards
Mark

 

[Johnny Best]

Welcome and good luck finding what you need.

 

[Pauly]

Had a similar convo on another forum,

While im not against alternative software brands, sometimes it's easier to use industry standard software. In this case, it would be Adobe Illustrator. Why? Because there's a lot more info out there, and more support.
And you can find an older version from torrents if you feel like going down that path.

 

[MrDav3C]

I have been using both CorelDraw and Adobe creative suite for around 25 years.

Back in the 90s Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator were first only available on Mac's and we ran PCs with windows on, so whilst illustrator and Photoshop weren't available to us CorelDraw was which may be one of the reasons this became our main "Go To" software for all of our design work.

Obviously graphic design software has come a long way since then and whilst I agree that illustrator has became the industry standard software which most designers and design agencies outside of the sign making industry will use, this doesn't necessarily mean it's the best solution or right fit for everyone or every sign making business / vehicle graphics business.

While both Illustrator and CorelDraw are certainly capable of designing vehicle graphics / wraps, shop signage, posters and much more, both have their own advantages and disadvantages.

I feel that Illustrator handles colours better, specifically gradients and transparencies.

I find CorelDraw more intuitive, easy to use and learn than Illustrator & I feel this leads to us creating artwork faster and easier than in Illustrator.

With Illustrator there are size limitations & often artwork needs to be designed at a scale whereas in CorelDraw you can design pretty much everything at actual size. I'm sure this isn't a problem for experienced designers but obviously it's worth thinking about before sending artwork to print and producing a high quality output.

The most recent advance in technology for Illustrator is the use of artificial intelligence, haven't got around to checking this out much myself but a friend of mine who also owns a sign making business has talked with me about this and from what I understand, the results can be pretty fantastic and make illustrator much easier and quicker to use.

I'm sure there are many other points to consider but these are the obvious things that came to my mind.

In reality we have and use both the Adobe Creative Suite and the Corel Graphics Suite, whilst we use CorelDraw significantly more than Adobe, we certainly wouldn't want to be without either of them!

 

[victor bogdanov]

Adobe CC subscription pretty good, no large upfront investment. Find someone with a .edu email address and get a nice discount.

PS the roland is an inkjet too

 

[damonCA21]

I have used Corel Draw for over 20 years for design. Any vector software is fine for what you need, although I find Corel more intuitive mainly because I learned on that in the first place. I actually still use X3 as my main design program, you dont need a really new version of a vector design program as the basics are all the same. As long as it exports as an EPS so you can send it to Versaworks then it will be fine

 

[w2csa]

I’ve been using Corel for 15 years. I also have the adobe suite. All are good. Welcome to the forum.

 

[bob]

Had a similar convo on another forum,

While im not against alternative software brands, sometimes it's easier to use industry standard software. In this case, it would be Adobe Illustrator. Why? Because there's a lot more info out there, and more support.
And you can find an older version from torrents if you feel like going down that path.

People think that Adobe is an industry standard because thew went to some school and Adobe was used exclusively. This is because, just like Apple products, Adobe essentially gave the stuff away to schools. When you only know one thing, nothing else exists for you. From that, the notion of Adobe as an industry standard began. It's nothing of the kind, just another flavor of Ford vs Chevy vs Dodge pickups.

 

[victor bogdanov]

People think that Adobe is an industry standard because thew went to some school and Adobe was used exclusively. This is because, just like Apple products, Adobe essentially gave the stuff away to schools. When you only know one thing, nothing else exists for you. From that, the notion of Adobe as an industry standard began. It's nothing of the kind, just another flavor of Ford vs Chevy vs Dodge pickups.

PDF is pretty much industry standard to print from. PDF is adobe. The best rips use adobe rip engines. Might as well use adobe design software

 

[WildWestDesigns]

PDF is pretty much industry standard to print from. PDF is adobe. The best rips use adobe rip engines. Might as well use adobe design software

Have to remember the PDF spec is royalty-free, so any program has the ability, free of charge, to be as good as they can be with that spec. So unlike most other formats of Adobe that most on here might deal with, PDF is one that can be handled by just about anyone wanting to write a program for it. Options for it are going to be greater. There are varying quality out there, due to one reason or another, but it's not due to licensing for the file format spec.

To a degree (especially in today's world) "bob" I believe is very much correct in that assessment. At one time, they had an advantage, and not much competition in that realm and school is really where they get people, because (as it has been mentioned in the forum) it's what they learned first (it's what I learned first as well, but I always stuck with tools that they have that are easily transferred to other programs, so when they started going down a route I didn't like, I was able to move over with less of an issue compared to others with more Adobe centric workflows) and people rarely (good or bad is up for debate) want to learn something new. And by advantage, I mean how well they work and work together within the suite of tools. That last part still holds up compared to the alternatives, from what I can tell from those that I don't use on the regular, but I know people that do. And that is a thing to consider if using multiple programs.


As to the less reputable means of getting Adobe products. There are alternatives out there that are cheaper (quality may will vary, some are quite good and depending on one's needs are able to be a viable alternative, but not for everyone) and if having Adobe is just the cost of doing business and one is good at their business, should be able to recoup that cost without having to do methods like that. I don't personally suggest those methods, just because there are so many options out there, but to each their own. Ironically, I always thought Adobe, for what one gets, was always on the cheaper end, even in the day of the perpetually licensed Master Suite level, I just have an aversion to SaaS model and there are other options that work for me, so I went elsewhere.

 

[The Big Squeegee]

 

[Scamper]

Thanks for all of your replies.
We have done some hunting and managed to get an older version (2019) of AI and have started on a course to learn it from the beginning. My wife is a couple lessons ahead of me already as I am doing the physical work setting up the print shop.
But we are going to see how we go for a couple of months and then revisit the idea of getting the latest.
I am old school and hate the subscription model, but it seems that is the way of the future.

As far as industryy standard, I guess it is more about, will it do the job you want and is there enough help and backup for it. This is the same with everything, like windows or mac, vhs or beta. The best won't nessasarliy win the one with the most clout ussually wins.

To show how old I am, I did a course on Oliveti word processing software back in the day, it was a 2 day course just for the olibiz package. and the software cost many thousands of dollars and came with 2 massive books.