Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 is a discontinued
vector graphics
Vector graphics is a form of computer graphics in which visual images are created directly from geometric shapes defined on a Cartesian plane, such as points, lines, curves and polygons. The associated mechanisms may include vector display a ...
and raster imaging software package developed by
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
.
History
Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000
Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 was released in 1999 along with
Microsoft Office 2000
Microsoft Office 2000 (version 9.0) is a release of Microsoft Office, an office suite developed and distributed by Microsoft for the Windows family of operating systems. Office 2000 was released to manufacturing on March 29, 1999, and was made av ...
Premium and Developer, but came separately on 2 CDs. It developed from the
Picture It!
Microsoft Picture It! is a discontinued Image editing, photo editing Application software, application created by Microsoft. Microsoft acquired the intellectual property rights and full U.S. trade registration from RomTech, later renamed eGames, ...
2.0 engine's .MIX format and expanded further into vector imaging technology. It required a separate installation from the main installer for the core Office suite, and was also released as a stand-alone product as part of Microsoft's Graphics Studio line of products (Greetings, etc.).
PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2
It released the subsequent version called Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 to
General Availability
A software release life cycle is the sum of the stages of development and maturity for a piece of computer software ranging from its initial development to its eventual release, and including updated versions of the released version to help impro ...
on October 4, 1999.
PhotoDraw Release Vehicles
PhotoDraw 2000 shipped via these release vehicles
* A standalone packaged product composed of 3 CDs.
* As part of Office 2000 Premium (CD 3 and CD4)
* As part of Office 2000 Developer (CD 3 and CD4)
PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 shipped via these release vehicles
* A standalone packaged product composed of 3 CDs.
* As part of Office 2000 Premium SR-1 (CD 3 and CD4)
* As part of Office 2000 Developer SR-1 (CD 3 and CD4)
Relationship to the Office Suite
Both versions of PhotoDraw were branded "Microsoft Office Application," and considered a "member of the family," as were other Microsoft applications (most notably
Publisher
Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...
) at the time.
Discontinuation
After PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 was released, Microsoft discontinued the program. Functional equivalent would be found in
Expression Graphic Designer
Microsoft Expression Design was Microsoft's commercial professional illustration vector and raster graphic design tool for web images based on Creature House Expression, which was acquired by Microsoft in 2003. It is available free of charge fro ...
.
Purpose and features
PhotoDraw is a full-featured dual-type (vector and bitmap) graphics software application like
Adobe Fireworks
Adobe Fireworks (formerly Macromedia Fireworks) was a bitmap and vector graphics editor, which Adobe acquired in 2005. Fireworks was made for web designers for rapidly creating website prototypes and application interfaces. Its features included ...
, developed for semiprofessional business use. It includes a vast library of clip-art, and a good collection of additional fonts. Its user interface introduced an activity-based approach (manifested in special graphic menus), a concept later evolving into the
Ribbon interface of modern MS Office and other applications.
As positioned mainly as an MS Office family companion and a business graphical solution suite, it was not useful enough for home users, who are more interested in manipulating digital pictures - which are bitmaps - than creating vector graphics. Microsoft has responded by bundling
Windows Picture and Fax Viewer
Windows Photo Viewer (formerly Windows Picture and Fax Viewer) is an image viewer included with the Windows NT family of operating systems. It was first included with Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 under its former name. It was temporarily r ...
with
Windows XP
Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct upgrade to its predecessors, Windows 2000 for high-end and ...
, developing
Microsoft Picture It!
Microsoft Picture It! is a discontinued photo editing application created by Microsoft. Microsoft acquired the intellectual property rights and full U.S. trade registration from RomTech, later renamed eGames, and released Version 1.0 of the app ...
, as well as creating
Microsoft Office Picture Manager
Microsoft Office Picture Manager (formerly Microsoft Picture Library) is a raster graphics editor introduced in Microsoft Office 2003 and included up to Office 2010. It is the replacement to Microsoft Photo Editor introduced in Office 97 and i ...
for Microsoft Office 2003 to expand on Microsoft Photo Editor. Furthermore, PhotoDraw was also not good enough to challenge Illustrator, the de facto standard for graphics professionals. For professional purposes Microsoft acquired, introduced and developed
Microsoft Expression Studio
Microsoft Expression Studio is a discontinued suite of tools for designing and building Web and Windows client applications and rich digital media content.
Overview
Microsoft introduced Microsoft Expression on September 16, 2005, at Microsoft's ...
, a graphics solution suite but it has been also discontinued, leaving MS Office users without any proper illustration tool with capabilities exceeding those of PowerPoint.
File Format Support
PhotoDraw's native file format is .MIX.
Photodraw can open files in these file formats:
* PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 Format (*.MIX)
* PhotoDraw 2000 Version 1 Format (*.MIX)
*
AutoCad
AutoCAD is a commercial computer-aided design (CAD) and drafting software application. Developed and marketed by Autodesk, AutoCAD was first released in December 1982 as a desktop app running on microcomputers with internal graphics controllers. ...
Format 2-D (*.dxf)
*
Computer Graphics Metafile
Computer Graphics Metafile (CGM) is a free and open international standard file format for 2D vector graphics, raster graphics, and text, and is defined by ISO/IEC 8632.
Overview
All graphical elements can be specified in a textual source file t ...
(*.cgm)
*
Corel Draw
CorelDRAW is a vector graphics editor developed and marketed by Corel Corporation. It is also the name of the Corel graphics suite, which includes the bitmap-image editor Corel Photo-Paint as well as other graphics-related programs (see below). T ...
(*.cdr)
*
Encapsulated Postscript
Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) is a Document Structuring Convention (DSC) conforming PostScript document format usable as a graphics file format. The format was developed as early as 1987 by John Warnock and Chuck Geschke, the founders of Adobe, ...
(*.eps)
*
Flashpix
FlashPix is a bitmapped computer graphics file format where the image is saved in more than one resolution. Its design anticipated that when an HTTP request is sent for the file by a browser plugin implementing the format, only the image compatibl ...
(*.fpx)
*
Graphics Interchange Format
The Graphics Interchange Format (GIF; or , see pronunciation) is a bitmap image format that was developed by a team at the online services provider CompuServe led by American computer scientist Steve Wilhite and released on 15 June 1987. ...
(*.gif, *.gfa)
*
JPEG File Interchange Format
The JPEG File Interchange Format (JFIF) is an image file format standard published as ITU-T Recommendation T.871 and ISO/IEC 10918-5. It defines supplementary specifications for the container format that contains the image data encoded with the JP ...
(*.jpg,*jpe,*.jpeg,*.jfif)
*
Kodak Photo CD (*.pcd)
*
Macintosh PICT (*.pct, *.pict)
*
MicroGrafx Designer/Draw (*.drw)
* Microsoft Image Composer (*.mic)
*
PC Paintbrush
PC Paintbrush was a graphics editing software created by the ZSoft Corporation in 1984 for computers running the MS-DOS operating system.
It was originally developed as a response to the first paintbrush program for the IBM PC, ''PCPaint'', whic ...
(*.pcx)
*
Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Inc. for Windows and macOS. It was originally created in 1988 by Thomas and John Knoll. Since then, the software has become the industry standard not only in raster ...
Files (*.psd)
*
Picture It!
Microsoft Picture It! is a discontinued Image editing, photo editing Application software, application created by Microsoft. Microsoft acquired the intellectual property rights and full U.S. trade registration from RomTech, later renamed eGames, ...
Format (*.MIX)
*
Portable Network Graphics
Portable Network Graphics (PNG, officially pronounced , colloquially pronounced ) is a raster-graphics file format that supports lossless data compression. PNG was developed as an improved, non-patented replacement for Graphics Interchange F ...
(*.png)
*
Tagged Image File Format
Tag Image File Format, abbreviated TIFF or TIF, is an image file format for storing raster graphics images, popular among graphic artists, the publishing industry, and photographers. TIFF is widely supported by scanning, faxing, word processin ...
(*.tif,*.tiff)
*
Targa
Targa or TARGA may refer to:
Car racing events
* Targa Adelaide, in Australia
* Targa Canada West, in British Columbia
*Targa Florio, in Sicily, Italy, 1906–1977
* Targa Florio Rally, in Sicily, Italy, from 1978
* Targa High Country, in Victori ...
(*.tga)
*
Windows Bitmap
The BMP file format, also known as bitmap image file, device independent bitmap (DIB) file format and bitmap, is a raster graphics image file format used to store bitmap digital images, independently of the display device (such as a graphics adapt ...
(*.bmp,*.dib,*rle)
*
Windows Metafile
Windows Metafile (WMF) is an image file format originally designed for Microsoft Windows in the 1990s. The original Windows Metafile format was not device-independent (though could be made more so with placement headers) and may contain both vector ...
(*.wmf)
*
Windows Enhanced Metafile
Windows Metafile (WMF) is an image file format originally designed for Microsoft Windows in the 1990s. The original Windows Metafile format was not device-independent (though could be made more so with placement headers) and may contain both vecto ...
(*.emf)
*
Wordperfect Graphics (*.wpg)
Photodraw can save files in these file formats:
* PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 Format (*.MIX)
* PhotoDraw 2000 Version 1 Format (*.MIX)
*
Graphics Interchange Format
The Graphics Interchange Format (GIF; or , see pronunciation) is a bitmap image format that was developed by a team at the online services provider CompuServe led by American computer scientist Steve Wilhite and released on 15 June 1987. ...
(*.gif)
*
JPEG File Interchange Format
The JPEG File Interchange Format (JFIF) is an image file format standard published as ITU-T Recommendation T.871 and ISO/IEC 10918-5. It defines supplementary specifications for the container format that contains the image data encoded with the JP ...
(*.jpg)
*
PC Paintbrush
PC Paintbrush was a graphics editing software created by the ZSoft Corporation in 1984 for computers running the MS-DOS operating system.
It was originally developed as a response to the first paintbrush program for the IBM PC, ''PCPaint'', whic ...
(*.pcx)
* Picture It! 4.0 (*.MIX)
* Picture It! 3.0 (*.MIX)
* Picture It! 2.0 (*.MIX)
*
Portable Network Graphics
Portable Network Graphics (PNG, officially pronounced , colloquially pronounced ) is a raster-graphics file format that supports lossless data compression. PNG was developed as an improved, non-patented replacement for Graphics Interchange F ...
(*.png)
*
Tagged Image File Format
Tag Image File Format, abbreviated TIFF or TIF, is an image file format for storing raster graphics images, popular among graphic artists, the publishing industry, and photographers. TIFF is widely supported by scanning, faxing, word processin ...
(*.tif)
*
Targa
Targa or TARGA may refer to:
Car racing events
* Targa Adelaide, in Australia
* Targa Canada West, in British Columbia
*Targa Florio, in Sicily, Italy, 1906–1977
* Targa Florio Rally, in Sicily, Italy, from 1978
* Targa High Country, in Victori ...
(*.tga)
*
Windows Bitmap
The BMP file format, also known as bitmap image file, device independent bitmap (DIB) file format and bitmap, is a raster graphics image file format used to store bitmap digital images, independently of the display device (such as a graphics adapt ...
(*.bmp)
Changes in PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2
*Improved performance and stability
*New Batch Save Wizard
*Setup based on the
Windows Installer
Windows Installer (msiexec.exe, previously known as Microsoft Installer, codename Darwin) is a software component and application programming interface (API) of Microsoft Windows used for the installation, maintenance, and removal of software. ...
engine
*Web effects
*Improved integration with Office applications
*Windows XP Compatibility
*Larger collection of clip-art and fonts
*New File Open/Save dialog boxes with places bar
Use of the .MIX file format
PhotoDraw's native file format is ".mix", a proprietary format developed by Microsoft. Only PhotoDraw can save and load its MIX files and retain the full ability to modify those files.
The MIME media-type for the MIX format is "image/vnd.mix"
IANA assignment for the MIX format
Product Lifecycle for PhotoDraw 2000 V2
*General Availability Date: 12/31/1999
*Mainstream Support Retired: 6/30/2004
*Extended Support Retired: 7/14/2009
Availability
PhotoDraw is no longer available for purchase from Microsoft.
References
External links
Microsoft Announces PhotoDraw 2000 on September 12, 1998Microsoft Announces PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 on October 4, 1999Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2 Debuts in Office 2000 SR-1 EditionsMicrosoft Product Lifecycle Dates for PhotoDraw
{{DEFAULTSORT:Microsoft Photodraw
1999 software
PhotoDraw
PhotoDraw
Vector graphics editors
Windows-only software