CorelDRAW Upgrades are Ending!???????????????!!!!!!!!!!

I'll just say in terms of sign design tasks, Adobe Illustrator is probably going to get a lot more friendly to that market soon. Some features (I can't say which) may arrive in an update before the CC 2021 version is introduced during the Adobe MAX convention (if the on-going SARS-CoV-2 pandemic doesn't cancel it). Let's just say Adobe isn't just standing still. They have a pretty large beta program for Illustrator and Photoshop.

I agree Inkscape is not really a viable alternative for CorelDRAW. The problem with Inkscape is the user interface is so clunky and feels like a throw-back to 1990's software. Inkscape does support most of the advanced features of OpenType, but it's a real pain to access extended features in any advanced OpenType font within Inkscape. Way way too many extra clicks are required. But a flip-side is none of the industry-specific graphics applications for the sign industry (Flexi, Gerber Omega, SignLab, Vinyl Express LXi, Vinyl Master Pro, etc) offer any full support for OpenType. And that's pretty shocking considering how important type is to sign design.

Affinity Designer has its own limitations. But it has a better interface than Inkscape. It's easier to use than Inkscape. And it's still cheap. Vectornator Pro is free on the iPad. There's a number of other low-cost vector graphics editing applications out there that are easily accessible to people who don't want to pay $500 for a non-subscription CorelDRAW license or get on a more expensive hook with Adobe.

Regarding video editing applications, I've never heard of Filmora Pro. It might be nice to use for those just wanting to edit their own personal videos for amateur or hobbyist use. On the professional end, I think Blackmagic Design poses a more legit challenge to Adobe. Blackmagic Design sells a lot of professional quality cameras, video switchers and other video production hardware -including gear capable of editing 8K footage. Their software is very mature, yet very affordable. DaVinci Resolve can hold its own against Premiere Pro. DaVinci Resolve Studio 16 costs $299 and has built in motion graphics, color correction and audio editing. The software works on Mac, Windows and Linux.

The sign business breaks down into two some times overlapping elements, commercial and artistic.

Commercial signage has been in a deflationary mode for 3 decades, I'm buying commercial signs and reselling them for a profit at a lessor sell price than I used to sell them for 5 years ago. That's deflation.  The second category, architectural signage, awards/donor walls, for quality designers and manufacturers have maintained their status from a profit margin point of view.

This forces the future of sign companies to fall into two categories, high volume, low margin mass production (read serious production controls, Gerber, Flexi Sign, ECT). The second, efficient art quality work with high profit margins. 

For the first category almost any application that produces a scalable vector in cmyk will work. It's better if it supports placing of images, as far as this goes the same can be said for most print and packaging work. With most work being digital or CMYK, most if not all the low cost or no cost graphic applications will function.  I see it being done with MS Publisher.

If this is the work you do I have no idea why anyone uses Adobe or CorelDRAW.  The net margins for this type of sign work are such that it's driving manufacturing companies to diversify or go out of business, look at their web sites, they sell signs, print, marketing doo dads, because their dying.

In my area I'm seeing the same thing happen to sign companies in the last five years that has been happening to print companies over the last twenty years. I'll also add marketing and advertising firms to that list.

The second type of signage which is still lucrative , I'll call art signs/walls is sensitive to the economy but extremely profitable and is not a place for Adobe. 

To be efficient ergo profitable in this arena you must not work in scale and be able to provide conceptual drawings, engineer drawing and manufacture drawing from the same file. Everyone I know doing this and not using CorelDRAW uses a conceptual software package and sends the concept to someone who knows what they are doing, this requires the project to go through another design step seriously increasing costs.

This is currently out of Adobe league for a couple reasons, the most serious is the manner in which they have trained their users to work with their programs. The work habits of Adobe users and newer Corel users place to much strain on computer systems. The files are crap period!

I say this was the most serious reason because for Adobe to be viable as a real large scale art sign application it has to be able like Corel to work 1 to 1 for 99% of projects. Adobe can't do that and if they only enlarge their art board without fixing how they handle the placement of images, fills and effects the processes used will crash the system. Adobe products are resource hogs.

This area is a serious profit center for smart CorelDRAW users. Will Adobe actually make sign making easier with their products? Who knows, all I can say is from what I see.

Application development has been shaped by designer demands without any thought for manufacturing. On the Corel side read this as font embedding, non destructive effect implementation and keep desktop objects on layer implementation.

If you have any graphic experience look around you and you'll see the effect of that concept everywhere in illegible work. If you've been in the graphics business for 3 or more decades you're feeling it in you wallet and seeing in in the reports from your accountants. Unless you've been smart.

Many changes have been taking place in the sign industry, but I don't agree that commercial signage is in some sort of overall deflationary mode. Up until this pandemic hit the company where I work has been doing better than ever. Some bigger, on-going projects (clients with multiple locations to do) are giving us a good bit of cushion in the downturn. We've stayed operational during the pandemic. One thing we've been doing lately is making a lot of clear, routed acrylic sneeze guards and dividers for cashier and service counters.

I also don't agree about some either-or characterization of what sign companies have to be. There have always been bean-counter types trying to figure out how to mass produce everything made by independent, custom shops. Some even try to scheme how to off-shore both the design and fabrication. There are many problems with this approach.

Commercial signs for businesses are usually not mass production items. There are far more small businesses than there are big national chains. And plenty of national chains divide their work among regional, full service sign companies (like ours). Signs often must be tailor-made to the client's specific needs. The signs also have to be tailor-made to comply with local sign codes, which vary to an extreme from one city or region to the next. Very often the customer and his location must be visited in person to understand exactly what he needs. Re-using existing sign cabinets and replacing faces is a big part of that business and those often require in-person surveys. The most fundamental thing is a sign company must develop on-going relationships with customers.

MS Publisher is not an acceptable sign design application. I don't know of any sign designers or manufacturers who use it. In terms of client-provided art files, I dislike .PUB files just about as much as the PowerPoint .PPT files Army people try to send.

Regarding differences between Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW or even any specialty "CAS" application, none of them has any built-in knowledge or expertise to tell a user how to design a sign, much less produce full size and scale drawings. None of that software tells the user how to do engineering. None of it tells the user what local sign codes require. That all requires experienced human input. The sign industry has job estimating software, but even that takes a lot of periodic adjustment for different markets and fluctuating materials prices.

Regarding signs that are illegible or just poorly designed, none of that is the fault of the software. Bad design is almost always the failure of the human making the design decisions. And if it's not the designer's fault, it's usually the fault of the customer who did his own DIY design work.

Since the late 1980's when desktop computers dramatically changed the graphic design industry much of that industry has been de-professionalized. The sign industry in particular has LOTS of self-taught amateurs with little if any formal design training at all. I wonder if some of these people even took an art class in high school. This problem is compounded by employers always trying to do things on the cheap. Computers come along. Employers think, "great, I can have my secretary do this work and not have to pay someone with a degree."

I'm not sure what Adobe will do "under the hood" with Illustrator if or when they enable large canvas design. I suppose they could take an approach similar to Photoshop and its "PSB" format for huge files. Illustrator is a resource hog in some areas, like the size of files it creates. CorelDRAW has its own resource management problems. It's far from being a crash-proof application. The Variable Fonts feature in CDR 2020 performs very terribly. Illustrator's VAR font function works far more smoothly on the same computer system. That's just one example.

Sign companies do need to keep an eye on the future and try to adapt to what's coming. I've been using CorelDRAW pretty heavily for many years and then using Adobe Illustrator for certain unique things it could do. Considering the business choices being made at Corel and Vector Capital (or rather KKR now), I worry about Corel's future. So I don't think it's smart for me to put all my eggs in the Corel basket.

You're talking about the health of one company I'm talking about the health of an industry. You'll always be able to find an example that does not fit the rule. I've been in graphics since 1975 so I have a long perspective.

I'm staying out of print and just talking signs.  In a 30 mile radius we have lost over a dozen quality sign manufactures, but we've gained maybe 150 or more SIGN companies.  These new ones are sticker people, the UPS store, the FEDEX Store, Postal Expresses, an occasional mom and pop and even all the printing companies now all sell signs. They sell vinyl stuck to something and it is a sign but now it's a commodity. READ not worth the effort.

I have 5 current projects, as part of the sign packages, one uses 246 three layered ADA signs, another uses 50 five layered ADA signs.  I simply do a concept mockup, (that can be done in friggin GIMP no one cares) and get material samples and maybe an actual mockup. After the material and concept is approved I pass along an e-mail list of the 246 signs, get a proof, receive delivery and install. The five layered ADA signs work just the same, an automated process with no graphics program required.  All 5 projects uses multiple elements that follow the same process work just the same, an automated process with no graphics program required, many times web based. NO Adobe or CorelDRAW required.  In number of signs these are the largest part of the projects.

Of these 5 projects all 5 use at least one, some as many as 3 lighted commercial grade sign cabinets or flush mounted channel letters. I can send any conceptual design from any program I want as a PDF the the vender and get the same price and quality. That delivered price is less than I can manufacture the signs myself. NO Adobe or CorelDRAW required. This works because the accuracy of the end result is not critical.

This process can and to some extent be applied to some monument, pylon and pole signage.  In fact I know 6 EX CorelDRAW users that now use Rhino, Sketchup or other Professional 3D architectural grade application for their conceptual design because of the poor release in CorelDRAW 2019 and 2020.  Now that requires that the secondary steps of manufacturing, engineering, permitting, electrical and lighting dispersal drawing be done in other programs. Which is the standard BS Adobe method be it signs or print. In any case no Adobe or CorelDRAW required.

Two of these projects require a total of three custom created aspects, manufacturing, engineering, permitting, electrical and lighting dispersal drawing are required.  Drawing precision is critical do to extraneous situations. Sizes of each element are in excess of 40'. If you want efficiency, CorelDRAW required!  The conceptual drawing done in CorelDRAW is the base for all other drawing, those drawing are required to be accurate and be supplied to the government.  The file may be a 20 to 50 pages 40' or larger file with effects, complex fills, images and what ever.

Interestingly I net more profit from these three elements than I do on the rest of the entire projects combined.

Adobe will need to completely revamp their entire thought process to really be viable in signs because outside of these custom projects most of the sign business won't be worth having within a decade.

You might have been doing graphics work since 1975, but I'm no newbie either. I've been in the sign industry almost 28 years, worked in TV broadcasting a couple years prior to that (after college) and was even doing paid graphics work going back to high school in the 1980's. I do happen to know a thing or two about where the sign industry has been and the directions where it could be headed.

I agree, "sticker stores" are not real sign companies. A real sign company will have at least some in-house manufacturing capability to make lighted sign cabinets, channel letters and other kinds of stuff that's more than just a flat Econolite panel with printed graphics slapped on it. A real sign company should have its own crane trucks to be able to install signs and do service work on them. We do have digital printers in our shop to produce everything from those decals up to vehicle wraps or even graphics printed direct to back-lit sign faces. Unlike those other guys we actually have some talent that can put that gear to good use. A couple of my co-workers also hand-paint murals.

I've seen lots of sign companies come and go through the years, including real, full service sign companies who end up going bust for a variety of reasons. The good companies that know their stuff, know their market, maintain good relationships with their customers and adapt to the future can survive the Johnny-come-lately sticker stores without any problem.

Really, the bigger threat to companies that build actual signs is government legislation. Some communities have very severe anti-signs sign ordinances. They'll greatly restrict or outright ban entire categories of signage, like lighted pylon signs or LED displays. They might restrict businesses to only a single building sign, and a tiny one at that. Then they cover up the main thoroughfares with lots of landscaping, trees and other "beautification" efforts. That way you can't tell if you're driving through a residential neighborhood or an actual business district. The lack of visible signage ends up hurting the marketing efforts of local retailers. People don't casually notice the store is there when they pass it. Or they can't even find the store when they're looking for it. So they go home. Chalk up more sales for Amazon.

My big worry is those same "beautification efforts" could end up infecting the cities where we do most of our business. I have a pretty intense hatred for poorly designed signs, in part because ugly signs and dilapidated signs help inspire and fuel those anti-signs ordinances. And I have to tell you a crappy "designer" can make horrible looking designs in CorelDRAW just as easy as any software. None of this stuff has "training wheels" to prevent someone from making horrid design choices. I can't stand the Arial typeface anymore, but it has more to do with Arial being a default font and bad sign designers squeezing it and stretching it to fit any space. Ugly signs accumulate. Fake sign companies who litter the landscape with ugly signs push the luck of everyone doing real sign work for a living.

People can try to use whatever graphics software they want to use in creating sign designs, mock-ups, etc. But whatever software is used must be able to get along with the specialty software used to drive routing tables and other specialty production hardware in a sign shop. I've never had any issues with artwork I created in CorelDRAW or Illustrator. I don't know how you're getting that Illustrator is wildly inaccurate either (I already responded to that in a different thread). Using 3D software like SketchUp is great, if the extra time re-doing the work in 3D is warranted. In most cases it is not necessary. If one client is frequently changing aspects of a design that client doesn't need to see a finished 3D mock-up with each revision, if he sees anything in 3D at all.

As to the final point, the only way that "most of the sign business won't be worth having in a decade" is if Amazon or something else puts most retailers, restaurants, small businesses and pretty much anything else with a store front next to a street out of business. There's always going to be a need for store front signs and sign companies to make them. The sign industry is not glamorous like major magazine publishing or motion picture visual effects. It's still an important industry nonetheless.

Adobe needs to do a few things, but not really all that much, to make Illustrator more friendly to sign design tasks. Even if they fix a lot of what's wrong, I'll probably still keep using CorelDRAW for a lot of tasks. But that's as long as Corel is still in business and my Corel software still works.

Here are some sample of signs that came in originally PDF files from Publisher or InkScape I can't remember which. In the end no Adobe or CorelDRAW would have been needed. Just send the PDF with scale information.  The 3 signs can be delivered to me for $2,900 less than I could manufacture them. We use two lifts and my lift truck not pictured. No Adobe or Corel required.