Serif DrawPlus 8 review

The companies that make drawing and illustration software tend to focus on the professional end of the market, as typified by expensive programs such as Adobe's Illustrator and the recently upgraded CorelDraw.

Serif's DrawPlus is something of an exception, as it attempts to provide affordable drawing tools for amateur artists and hobbyists.

The latest version of DrawPlus includes a long list of new features, although the most significant new tools help you create effects that look more like bitmap paint effects than conventional vector-based drawings.

The most important new feature is the paint brush tool, which allows you to choose from around 200 different types of brush. The simplest brushes are small vector-based designs, such as a snowflake or a yin-yang symbol. Selecting one of these brushes allows you to paint the relevant symbol quickly across the screen, perhaps dotting a series of snowflakes across a landscape scene.

However, there are more complex brushes that attempt to mimic the appearance of paint effects. The water paint brushes simulate the appearance of a watery streak of paint that tapers towards the end of the stroke, just as a real brush stroke would. However, a kind of vector skeleton follows the path of your stroke. You can edit your brush stroke by using the program's vector tools to click on the skeleton and change its shape. The brush stroke then adjusts itself so that it follows the new path. This allows you to create realistic paint effects that you can edit with a precision that isn't possible in bitmap-based programs such as Corel's Painter Essentials program.

The brush library includes categories for water paints, pencils, charcoal and pastels, so you have plenty of scope to experiment. You can also apply a variety of paper textures to your drawings to create even more realistic effects. However, you'll still need a bit of artistic talent to create your own drawings using these brushes. We think Serif is missing a trick here by not making it easier for less-talented people to import photographs and turn them into drawings and sketches. There is an Auto-trace feature that can attempt to do this for you, but it's rather slow and clumsy and not ideal for beginners who need a little help to get started.

The biggest problem for DrawPlus is that people who want to create natural-media artwork might simply be tempted to buy a genuine natural-media program, such as Painter Essentials, which is a little cheaper than DrawPlus. However, vector graphics are still more useful for creating artwork such as logos and letterheads, as well as animated graphics for use on web pages and presentations. If that's what you need, DrawPlus is an effective, affordable option. However, amateur artists who simply want to create nice-looking paintings and sketches should go for Painter Essentials instead.