Training / Macromedia
Freehand Basics

Macromedia Freehand is the vector program of choice for many graphic and Web designers. It's used to create razor-sharp illustrations that print or enlarge to any size with little or no degradation.

In this 6-lesson course, you'll explore the wide horizons open to Freehand users. You'll create illustrations, Web graphics, animations, newsletter layouts for print and Web, and more.

Once you've mastered the basics, we're sure you'll agree that Freehand is the fastest, most powerful tool to get the job done.

Ian Kelleigh is a designer who runs an award-winning tutorial Web site ... get bio

Outline:

LESSON 1 Intro to Freehand Lesson One launches the course with an animated exploration of Freehand's powerful drawing tools. You'll get a thorough tour of the Freehand toolkit, learning how to set up documents and customize your work space. Then you'll get stuck in to what Freehand's best at: drawing. By emulating the work of a master painter, you'll learn how to create paths and shapes using Freehand's Pen, Pencil, and Fill tools -- bread and butter tools for any Freehand user. If Picasso had only had Freehand!

LESSON 2 The Layout Tool Did you think that page layout was just for Quark or Indesign pros? Think again. Lesson Two explores the flexibility of Freehand as a desktop publishing tool. You'll investigate Freehand's text toolbar, learning how to create text boxes and set up styles throughout a document. You'll discover how to use symbols and brushes to create graphic consistency without mushrooming file size. Finally, the use of master pages is explored to keep multiple pages consistent with background elements. In the exercise, you'll create business cards for friends and family.

LESSON 3 Freehand Animation As vector-based programs, Macromedia Flash and Freehand are becoming increasingly interdependent. Lesson Three explores this synergy, looking at how to animate using Freehand alone. As you'll soon discover, the layers and blend tools provide a creative environment for motion graphics, while the release to layers option gives you many options for morph animation. In the exercise, you'll combine these Freehand techniques by animating a logo.

LESSON 4 Digital Publishing Lesson Four takes your page layout skills to the next level. You'll learn important print layout techniques, such as wrapping text around graphics, applying text to paths, working with multiple text boxes, and formatting text using styles. Then, to equip you for the networked publishing environment, we'll look at exporting to PDF format for both print and Web. In the exercise, you can create a newsletter to broadcast what you've learned.

LESSON 5 Pushing the Envelope Once you've mastered Web and print layout, you'll naturally want to showcase it to clients. Lesson Five explores some of Freehand's interactive navigation features, tools you can use to create emailable or Web-based galleries for design customers. You'll begin by exploring live envelopes, a creative tool for warping text or objects. Then you'll discover in Freehand how to publish your work as HTML docs or SWF files. In the exercise, you'll create a slightly warped tour of the solar system.

LESSON 6 Interfaces and Web Sites Freehand is a great authoring environment for creating art for games, interfaces, and Web sites. Lesson Six explores these new dimensions, showing you how to create a game with interactive buttons via a simple Flash movie in Freehand. As your Final Project, you'll design Web site "comps," using layers to make them interactive, and learning the optimal way to display them to clients, both on the Web and in print.