POLL: Web artists, favorite illustration program?

[Schadenfreude]

Well, I'm used to Illustrator more than anything, and I've been willing to try out other Illustration Programs . . . which ones do you guys use? And if you use other progrmas, what are the strengths/weaknesses of it?

 

[Czar]

depends on what you are going to use it for

for web design I would have to say macromedia fireworks, outclasses photoshop for web graphics by far
for painting and drawing there are three main contesters, Photoshop, Painter and Open Canvas
for illustrating and general line art I would have to say illustrator but I have only had very little experiance with it, but I know freehand very well and illustrator felt better, more polished

 

[WobbleWobble]

Fireworks user here

 

[Schadenfroh]

how is the gimp?

 

[stndn]

I would use gimp, but too bad it doesn't support vector graphics.
(or if it does, i never figured out the options to create vector graphics)

At work my coworkers use macromedia freehand for design and photoshop for image manipulation.

 

[drag]

Photoshop doesn't do vector graphics either. Vector graphics is entirely different from messing around with bitmaps, it doesn't make sense realy to mix the two.

You use a limited bit to make masks and such, but if you want a free program to do vector graphics check out inkscape.

Right now I use for FREE (as in freedom, open source, free software type things) are
Gimp = bitmap/image manipulation.
Inkscape = vector graphics
Scribus = Desktop publishing/layout program (like what quark express is for)
Blender = 3-d modeling
POV-ray = raytracer

And there are a few other besides that, but those are the best so far that I am aware of. The most professional of them, I mean.

I don't know of a realy good painting program. I considur Gimp and Photoshop to be image manipulation more so then image creation. Stuff like Fractal Painter is completely different, IMO. You can do some painting in Photoshop and Gimp, but I don't like to do that. It's like using Photoshop or Illistrator to do layout work(pain in the rear). The fonts always looked screwed up, it takes to much work to do simple stuff, it's just not worth it. So that's how I feel about painting in Gimp/Photoshop, too.

I would realy like to find a good free (as in FLOSS) that can do painting well.