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AxoTools adds Axo Shear tool

AxoTools Rotate tool iconAxoTools now includes an Axo Shear tool that will allow you to shear artwork that’s already been projected onto an axonometric plane. It functions similar to Adobe’s Shear tool in that its default anchor point is the center of the selection, but you can click to place the anchor anywhere you’d like.

shear tool demo

The plugin will display a cube annotation with one of the three axonometric faces highlighted. Simply tap the Alt/Option key to choose the plane you’re working on. Drag to shear the art, and the current shear angle will be shown near the cursor. Press the Shift key while dragging to constrain the shear to increments of 15°.

To shear art numerically on a projected plane, Alt/Option click on a location for the anchor point of the operation. In the dialog box that appears, fill in the shear amount, the axis angle to shear on, and the face upon which to shear.

The new tool is available in the current version of AxoTools for Adobe Illustrator 2019 – 2022. You can download it here for either Mac or Windows.

AxoTools adds “Free” mode

Some of you may recall using a free “Isometric Line Tool” plugin for Adobe Illustrator. I wrote it in 1997 to simply draw straight lines constrained to isometric angles. When I rewrote my plugins for CS6 and CC, it was renamed simply “IsoTool.”

axo line toolThe plugin was discontinued after it was included in AxoTools, but remained free to use after the trial had expired. As AxoTools gained new features, the free tool could seem buried amid nine tools and six panels. Now AxoTools includes a “Free” mode to accommodate those users. Unlicensed installation of the plugin have a menu item File > AxoTools > Show only free AxoTools features. If you choose this item, the next time you launch Adobe Illustrator, AxoTools will load only the free features. As part of AxoTools, the free parts go beyond the old line tool.

Projection panel

The Projection panel gives you any axonometric projection you choose, not just isometric. The Projection buttons won’t do anything and the Options are irrelevant, but the preset menu will allow you to save and quickly recall your favorite settings.

draw tools free settings

Now you can choose to automatically apply either of two line weights as you draw, as well as to automatically concatenate lines. The stroke widths you choose will be saved in your plugin’s preferences.

The multi-purpose Axo tool now retains its Move functions for selected artwork for Free mode users to easily move artwork along the current axonometric paths. This includes selected anchor points within a path.

Axo Info panel

The Axo Measure tool is also available for free. It measures distances and angles, including the delta between two angles, as measured on any of the axonometric or orthographic planes.

And if you later decide to go for a license (annual licenses are currently on sale for only $5/year), that remains an option as well. You can download it here for Adobe Illustrator 2019 – 2022 for either Mac or Windows.

Measurements made easier

Measuring and then entering distances and angles can be a lot of busywork, which AxoTools Measure tool can help streamline. Just click and drag with the Measure tool. These values are entered into the AxoTools Information panel as measured on your artboard in orthographic projection, as well as the three axonometric planes of your current document projection, plus the depth axis of any currently-defined auxiliary projection.

In addition, many of the text fields in AxoTools panels have shortcuts to import values from that panel. For example, you can drag the tool along an edge of an extrude art object to measure its length and angle. Then in the Extrude panel, double-click the Distance and Angle field labels to automatically enter the last-measured values, then simply click the Extrude button. It’s so fast and easy, it almost feels like we’re cheating!

easy extruding

The double-click trick also works for the Projection panel’s X and Z axis fields and the Transformation panel’s Extrude distance field. To auto-enter values into the Transformation’s Move/Rotate field, just type an “a” for angle or “d” for distance as appropriate for your current operation. In the transformation panel’s two fields, you can also type “=” to toggle the value between positive and negative.

measuring an axonometric angle

You may want to measure the difference between two angles on an axonometric drawing. Using Illustrator’s built-in Measure tool, you would measure one angle, write down the result, measure another angle, write down that result, then do the math to find the difference, and it would still only be accurate for the flattened view. AxoTools’ Measure tool can work as an axonometric protractor — just click on an anchor point, then drag between two points. You’ll see the corresponding angle from your axonometric plane.

Now you can also now do simple math operations in many of AxoTools’ panels’ fields. For example, you can enter “.25 in + 2mm” and the Extrude panel will calculate the equivalent distance in your current document ruler units (e.g., 23.6693 pt). You can also do math on angles, such as “90 – 32.48” for “57.52°.” Division is done with a “/” character and multiplication with a “*” character.

You can download AxoTools and try it out with 1,000 trial operations. It’s on sale for 1/3 off through May 2022, with annual subscriptions 1/2 off, starting as low as $5!

AxoTools adds new Measure tool

measure tool Axo Measure tool

info panel
AxoTools 23.0.2 adds a new tool that acts as both an axonometric ruler as well as a protractor. It allows you to measure distances and angles in any of the three axonometric axes, scaled for the foreshortening factor of that plane, whether its projection is isometric, dimetric, or trimetric. Measurements are displayed for all axo planes as well as orthographic.

The tool is automatically constrained along your current axonometric axes, or press Shift to constrain to the nearest 45°, or press Alt/Option for no constraints at all.

In the Info panel, choose a set of measurements to display, or choose “Auto” to let the tool guess what you’re measuring based on the direction you drag the mouse. Choose “All” to see all results in fields where you can copy values to paste elsewhere.

To use the tool, simply click and drag to measure a distance and an angle. To measure the difference between two angles on an axonometric plane, click once to set an anchor point, then drag an arc from one point to another.

The free update is available for Adobe Illustrator CC 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022.

Enter measurements your way in AxoTools

With the latest update to AxoTools, you can enter measurements in whatever units you’re comfortable with. Here’s an example:

extrude units in mmextrude units in inches

Say your document ruler units is set to inches, but you need to extrude something to a distance you have in mm. Illustrator supports that within the app, but it’s not automatically there for plugins. Measurement fields in AxoTools now do that conversion for you. I really hadn’t planned at first on adding that — there’s a back story here.

First, all art in Adobe Illustrator is measured internally in points. Fortunately, Adobe’s interface for plugins includes a function that takes measurements from text typed by the user in the current ruler units and converts it to a numeric value calculated as points. Then another function converts numeric point values used within the plugin to text that plugins can give back to the user, calculated and formatted using their current ruler units. That’s great, but there are a lot of users in other parts of the world that use a comma as a decimal separator. Fortunately, Adobe added a variation of these functions that support international number formats. Unfortunately, the one that parses text with commas in decimals doesn’t see the commas, and the values get multiplied by ten, a hundred, or a thousand! Adobe’s bug became my bug.

To support my European customers, I wrote a function that parses the numbers typed, and honors commas as decimal separators, and wondered “Why not look at the units specified, as well?” All values need to be converted to points anyway for the plugin to work with, so it wasn’t a great leap code-wise.

draw settings units

As an extension of that, I wrote a function to convert values back to text with a caveat of my own. In AxoTools’ Draw Settings panel, users can specify standard stroke weights, but we don’t all use points for strokes — many use mm. Stroke measurements have little to do with our current ruler units, so the plugin lets you specify pt or mm, does the math when needed, then remembers your preference to always display it your way.

It can be frustrating dealing with bugs, but sometimes bugs can become butterflies!

2022 plugins may crash older Macs under Catalina

I have received a handful of reports that 2022 plugins either crash Illustrator or Illustrator refuses to load them citing a conflict with its internal plugins. So far, affected systems are:

  • 2013 or 2014 27″ iMac or
    2012 MacBook Pro
  • macOS 10.15 Catalina
  • Adobe Illustrator 2022

The problem may be resolved by updating macOS to Big Sur (11.0) or higher, if your Mac supports it (late 2013 models and newer).

If the plugins continue to crash under macOS 11 or higher, please use the contact form using the button below and include:

  • Your computer model
  • OS version
  • Description of problem (crash or no-load dialog)
  • Crash report if available

Another option, of course, is to continue using Adobe Illustrator 25 (2021) with the corresponding version of the plugins.

Contact Support

Plugin version changing from 16 to 23

Here’s why it’s important (to some of us)

The CORE developer libraries used for the 2022 version of all Graffix plugins for Adobe Illustrator no longer support Illustrator versions older than CC 2019, so new and updated plugins will require CC 2019 and above. Plugins for CS6 through CC 2018 will remain available so new users with older systems can still use the latest legacy releases, then update whenever they’re ready.

  • CS6 – CC 2018 (Legacy) = plugin version 16
  • CC 2019 – AI 2021 = plugin version 16, will be replaced with version 23 as updates are made
  • AI 2022 = plugin version 23

All v.23 plugins honor v.16 licenses, so simply install as always, no special steps are required.

Adobe Illustrator 2022 (v. 26) compatible!

Updates to plugins for Adobe Illustrator 2022 (v. 26) are complete. Updated plugins now include:

  • AxoTools
  • Cleanup Tool
  • Concatenate
  • Cutting Tools
  • Nudge Panel
  • Select Menu
  • Square Up
  • TextSync
  • ToolShed

Apple M1 processors are also supported in the AI 2022 build.

Important note:

Graffix plugins compiled with CORE libraries which supported Adobe Illustrator versions back to CS6 have plugin versions 16.x (the minimum version of AI required). The latest CORE libraries for AI 2022 support only Illustrator CC 2019 (AI 23) and later, so new plugin releases will have plugin version 23.

If you purchased a license for a version 16 plugin, the 2022 compatibility update is free (as has been since CS6-to-CC) and the v. 16 activation code will continue to work in your v. 23 plugin.

If you’re running Graffix plugins under Illustrator 2021 or earlier, those plugins may occasionally get maintenance updates and will alert you when a v. 16 update becomes available. New features will be limited to the v 23 plugins on CC 2019 and later. For now, users will need to manually download and install the v. 23 version of the plugin, since the v 16 plugins only look for v. 16.x updates.

That said, only the 2022 versions are new v. 23 builds. AI23 – AI25 plugins will be replaced in the downloads section later, and those on the Support mailing list will be notified when they’re all ready.

Thanks,

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