astute graphics

[Hanschrs]

Hi team, I'm reaching out to get some feedback on Astute Graphics. I'm currently trying out the trial version and I'm curious to know if the subscription is worth the investment. Has anyone had long-term experience with the plugin and its additional features? Your insights would be greatly appreciated

[Bobby Henderson · Accepted solution]

The $149 annual cost seems a bit steep, but I think it's worth it for what the plugins can do. They can save a lot of time and offer a bunch of new creative options. It all comes down to your workflow and creative needs. I've been using the plugins since the Creative Suite days.

I frequently use the Vector First Aid plugin to help clean up/repair a lot of sub-par customer provided art files. It can quickly fix a lot of very problematic junk within art imported from PDF files, such as duplicate paths that are invisible. The plugins associated with VectorScribe, InkScribe and ColliderScribe can be very helpful to a variety of technical drawing tasks. There are so many more plugins it's almost overwhelming -especially if you make the mistake of clicking the Window>Astute Graphics>Show All command. That's a lot of plugin palettes!

If you decide not to get an Astute Graphics subscription you'll still be able to keep the Auto Savior, Direct Prefs and Mirror Me plugins.

[DougKatz · Accepted solution]

Bobby said it right: Astute Graphics saves enormous amounts of time and unleashes a startling array of innovative capabilities.

The plug-ins have become essential to my illustration and design work over the last decade. I can look at any project I've worked on and see glaring evidence that one or more AG plug-ins made it not just easier but more inventive, more dramatic, more robust. Once you learn their power, you begin to think differently about your creative and technical options.

For me—a mere user with no connection to Astute Graphics—the $149.00 makes life in Adobe Illustrator both more efficient and more enjoyable.  

[Andrei Busuioc]

They are very good. However i am not confortable paying annually for them. Too big of a price for using them from time to time. I guess if you use all of them all the time its justified. Otherwise its like paying for the gym in advance.

[Ronald23919321bsq0]

Why its not avilable in adobe ? 

[Bobby Henderson]

The Illustrator development team has only so many people and resources. For over 30 years other companies have been producing third party plugins to add unique features and even industry specific functions to applications like Illustrator and Photoshop. In certain cases, like that of Astute Graphics, the developer talent base at the outside company adds fresh new ideas.

In some cases an app like Illustrator will add a feature similar to something from a third party plugin. Still, there is only so much the Illustrator development team can do -especially if the task was duplicating the features from Astute Graphics' plugin arsenal. Plus there may be legal issues with duplicating some third party plugin features.