Graphics software for stompboxes

[quaternotetriplet]

Inkcape is better than gimp.

[JiM]

Inkcape is better than gimp.

They just are not for the same things. But they work well together !

For enclosure design, drilling/dimensions is obviously better done in vector graphics, but you might want to use bitmap decorations.
For circuit design, unless you use dedicated CAD software like Eagle, gEDA or Kicad, vector graphics is the way to go.
For reverse engineering, i bless the Gimp for gutshots processing.

[abfackeln]

I've heard of "front panel designer". Is it any good?

I use front panel designer to lay out templates for drilling enclosures (along with a set of digital calipers). Super accurate for placement of holes - once I have the drilling template set up, I copy it into Flash or Fireworks (both Adobe) for creating the graphics. Or you could dump it into any of the great graphics programs mentioned earlier....

[JimiMan]

Before I made the switch to mac, I was using microsoft visio for all of my graphic designing which suited the simple stuff I did fine, but after the switch I don't really no what to go with. Anyone know of anything I could use? I don't need anything to fancy just plain and simple, easy to use. Cheap is great, free, even better. Thanks

[nooneknows]

Anyone know of anything I could use? I don't need anything to fancy just plain and simple, easy to use. Cheap is great, free, even better. Thanks

OpenOffice, Gimp and Inkscape run on Mac too
ciao

[HostileAudio]

I would see if you can get a demo of illustrator , for a living i work with linux on a vast scale so am all for the opensource apps like inkscape and gimp but having tried both and being slightly frustrated i decided to try illustrator on my mac ,within an hour my design was done and printed!!

Luckily I already had used photoshop ( back from my days of designing "Adult" websites ) so i already had a rough idea of where to click but i don't think it would be that much of a learning curve.

[kleuck]

I'm a Linux user, so i use Gimp, but if i love it as a bitmap editor, it lacks a lot of features at it comes to text (next version will be better it's been said) but you have Inkscape for vector etc.
Scribus can be useful too

[roseblood11]

I use Papyrus Office for most of my designs. It's basically a word processor, but the most intuitive one I've ever seen, I started with the Atari version back in the 15th century. It's easy to place text very accurately, because papyrus supports "micro spacing" and a lot of DTP functionality. Have a look at the demo version - sometimes you don't need more than a screen shot ) (btw: that's how I use the free demo version of "Frontplattendesigner" to make scales for pots...)
Papyrus is not freeware, but worth every cent, because every sentence in this text is true: http://www.rom-logicware.com/papyrus.htm
I use it for almost everything, letters, spreadsheets, reference management, scientific papers, practice management...

http://www.rom-logicware.com/

For bitmap graphics I use photofiltre (because it's quick) and sometimes photoshop elements

[meffcio]

I've got two questions to the users of Inkscape:
1. How to make an actual outer stroke on an object? I don't want to make it's contour thicker, because when it's thick enough for me, it covers some of the object's surface. I just want a stroke on the object.
2. Well, I'm TRYING to design label for a BMP-styled pedal for a friend, and damn, I don't know how to work on custom shapes.
Making something like that

asd.png

took me a lot more time than it should. I SOMEHOW (I even forgot how I did it) made it from a rectangle and two circles, but even worse...
3. ...The shape of the rounded corners changed so much when I changed the size (Or aspect ratio? Don't really know how to say it properly. I mean the proportions of the sides) of the rectangle. Is there a way to prevent this?
4. Do you know any good tutorials for making such designs in Inkscape?
Thanks in advance,
Pozdrowienia

[JiM]

3. ...The shape of the rounded corners changed so much when I changed the size (Or aspect ratio? Don't really know how to say it properly. I mean the proportions of the sides) of the rectangle. Is there a way to prevent this?

The rectangle tool includes a "rounded corner" handle, it's diamond-shaped IIRC. Those rounded corners do scale properly.

In the end, anything in Inkscape is (or can be converted into) a path, which is a Bezier curve.
You can edit each point with the "sharp arrow" tool.

There are many tutorials available ... you can start here :
http://inkscape.org/doc/
http://inkscape.org/doc/shapes/tutorial-shapes.html
http://inkscapetutorials.wordpress.com/

[itsik]

I've got two questions to the users of Inkscape:
1. How to make an actual outer stroke on an object? I don't want to make it's contour thicker, because when it's thick enough for me, it covers some of the object's surface. I just want a stroke on the object.
2. Well, I'm TRYING to design label for a BMP-styled pedal for a friend, and damn, I don't know how to work on custom shapes.
Making something like that

asd.png

took me a lot more time than it should. I SOMEHOW (I even forgot how I did it) made it from a rectangle and two circles, but even worse...
3. ...The shape of the rounded corners changed so much when I changed the size (Or aspect ratio? Don't really know how to say it properly. I mean the proportions of the sides) of the rectangle. Is there a way to prevent this?
4. Do you know any good tutorials for making such designs in Inkscape?
Thanks in advance,
Pozdrowienia

In order to make this shape you need the rectangle tool. here's what you need to do:
Create 2 rectangles, with no fill and a stroke of your choice of width and color (under the object menu you're able to open the fill/stroke properties window, where you set your preferences for each object) make sure to select rounded corners for one of the rectangles, then, when selected, you can set the radius of the corners using the RX & RY values you have on the upper tool bar, again, with the rectangle selected.
once your happy with the result, place your regular rectangle under the rounded corner one, make sure they're overlapping each other in a way that gives you the final size of the shape you want. Select both of them (using the shift key) and then use the "Combine" tool under the Path menu (Ctrl+K) to convert them into one shape.

Hope this helps ...
Itsik

[fuzzfiend]

Being a Windows zombie, I've used a couple of free programs to create graphics:

I used Inkscape to do my last pedal. As a vector graphics program, it was way easy to create shapes and simply resize them to fit the way they needed. Text was also easy to create, move and stretch to fit. I started by creating the enclosure outline, pots and switches and then used the layers to create the pedal layout, drill chart and graphics. The learning curve wasn't that bad and there is a ton of online help if you want info on how to make the program do something more advanced (ie: creating clock-like tic marks around the knobs).

For my previous pedal, I used paint.net. It was a bitmap program, like Paint that comes with the windows OS, but had a ton more features. It also utilizes layers, so creating the pedal layout, drill chart and graphics could all be done simply and harmoniously. Paint.net also has lots of online help available. The learning curve seemed less severe than The Gimp, but still had much of same functionality.

I think you could get great results with either program, but I found Inkscape to be more forgiving and faster to use. If you're determined to create .bmp's, paint.net was a nice balance between features and complexity.

My 2 cents,
FF