SAMArt

From Fred 67

SAMArt by Nigel French

This disk has two files on it; the SamArt program itself, and a slideshow. SamArt is a PD art package, sort of a poor mans SamPaint (the originality of names for SAM art packages really does astound me). It is a mouse or keyboard controlled thing, with many options such as: spray can, variable pen and brush, shape drawing (only boxes and circles, unfortunately), a solid fill option, text and several line drawing options, like radial, continuos or single.

It also has an option to dump to a printer, which I wasn't able to test as my printer is currently being repaired. And that's it really. One other thing is that, like SamPaint, it uses the workscreen / drawscreen technique, instead of the split screen method.

So what do I think of it? There are a couple of annoying faults with it, the main one being when drawing circles. Drawing small ones is fine, but when you draw bigger ones, the diameter kind of increases by about 20 pixels or so at a time, so sometimes it is impossible to get the correct size.

Another smaller niggle is that the freehand line draw is a bit crap, as curves often appear jagged.Apart from these things, though, it is a worthwhile program.

If you haven't bought SamPaint, and enjoy using a mouse for artwork but cannot stand the useless mouse option on Flash, then get it. If you have done the decent thing and bought SamPaint, then it is not worth it.

Overall : 80%