inkscape

Inkscape Overview

 Free Download

Official Site

http://inkscape.org/

What is Inkscape?

Inkscape is professional quality vector graphics software which runs on Windows, Mac 

OS X and Linux. It is used by design professionals and hobbyists worldwide, for creating

 a wide variety of graphics such as illustrations, icons, logos, diagrams, maps and web 

graphics. Inkscape uses theW3C open standard SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) as its

 native format, and is free and open-source software.

Inkscape has sophisticated drawing tools with capabilities comparable to Adobe Illustrator, 
CorelDRAW and Xara Xtreme. It can import and export various file formats, including 
SVG, AI, EPS, PDF, PS and PNG. It has a comprehensive feature set, a simple interface,
 multi-lingual support and is designed to be extensible; users can customize Inkscape's 
functionality with add-ons.
The Inkscape project has a growing international user community, and many learning
 materialsexist to help get you started with your creations. Help and support is provided by the community, and there are lots of ways for you to get involved if you want to help improve
 the Inkscape project.
Inkscape is a member of the Software Freedom Conservancy, a US 501(c)(3) non-profit

 organization. Contributions to Inkscape are tax deductible in the United States.

Features of Inkscape

Object creation

• Drawing: pencil tool (freehand drawing with simple paths), pen tool (creating Bezier curves and straight lines), calligraphy tool (freehand drawing using filled paths representing calligraphic strokes)
• Shape tools: rectangles (may have rounded corners), ellipses (includes circles, arcs, segments), stars/polygons (can be rounded and/or randomized), spirals
• Text tool (multi-line text, full on-canvas editing)
• Embedded bitmaps (with a command to create and embed bitmaps of selected objects)
• Clones ("live" linked copies of objects), including a tool to create patterns and arrangements of clones

Object manipulation

• Transformations (moving, scaling, rotating, skewing), both interactively and by specifying exact numeric values
• Z-order operations (raising and lowering)
• Grouping objects ("select in group" without ungrouping, or "enter the group" making it a temporary layer)
• Layers (lock and/or hide individual layers, rearrange them, etc; layers can form a hierarchical tree)
• Alignment and distribution commands

Fill and stroke

• Color selector (RGB, HSL, color wheel)
• Color picker tool
• Copy/paste style
• A gradient editor capable of multi-stop gradients
• Pattern fills (bitmap/vectors)
• Dashed strokes, with many predefined dash patterns
• Path markers (ending and/or beginning marks, e.g. arrowheads)

Operations on paths

• Node editing: moving nodes and Bezier handles, node alignment and distribution, etc.
• Converting to path (for text objects or shapes), including converting stroke to path
• Boolean operations
• Path simplification, with variable threshold
• Path insetting and outsetting, including dynamic and linked offset objects
• Bitmap tracing (both color and monochrome paths)

Text support

• Multi-line text
• Uses any installed outline fonts, including right-to-left scripts
• Kerning, letterspacing, linespacing adjustments
• Text on path (both text and path remain editable)
• Text in shape (fill shape following stroke)

Rendering

• Fully anti-aliased display
• Alpha transparency support for display and PNG export
• Complete "as you drag" rendering of objects during interactive transformations

Misc

• Live watching and editing the document tree in the XML editor
• PNG, OpenDocument Drawing, DXF, sk1, PDF, EPS and PostScript export formats
• Command line options for export and conversions
• Perfectly compliant SVG format file generation and editing