Where can I find a MacDraw-like program for Windows?

September 12, 2006 1:08 PM

Where can I find a MacDraw-like program for Windows, preferably shareware or low cost?

Way back in the 1980's, I used to be able to use MacDraw to create decent drawings. I could choose shapes (circles, rectangles, lines, and so forth) from the palette, put them onto the canvas, resize them, color them, and so forth. It was easy!

Now all of the popular drawing programs (The Gimp, Photoshop, etc) seem to be layer-oriented instead of object-oriented.

I really need a simple yet powerful object-oriented drawing program for Windows. MacDraw-like functionality (20 years after the fact) would be just fine.

Any suggestions?

posted by jeffbarr to computers & internet (10 answers total)

I've not used MacDraw but Inkscape and Sodipodi are opensource vector editors for windows.
posted by Memo at 1:11 PM on September 12, 2006 [1 favorite]

Deneba Canvas.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 1:19 PM on September 12, 2006

Why not just use Paint (it comes with Windows)?
posted by internal at 1:52 PM on September 12, 2006

Now all of the popular drawing programs (The Gimp, Photoshop, etc)

These aren't drawing programs -- although people do draw with them -- they're largely photo-editing applications.

Illustrator is a drawing program (or, as Memo puts more specifically, a vector editor), and probably the largest in the field. I'm not familar enough with MacDraw to know if it was/is pixel-based at its lowest level, but probably a vector -based illustration program is still going to meet your needs best.

thus, open source illustrator on google will get you a number of pages discussing possible alternatives.
posted by fishfucker at 1:53 PM on September 12, 2006

Just tried out Inkscape and it was just what I was looking for. Thanks Memo, and everyone else.
posted by jeffbarr at 2:03 PM on September 12, 2006

Paint .NET is pretty cool, but is still layer-oriented.
posted by mrbugsentry at 3:00 PM on September 12, 2006

[MacDraw is vector-oriented. Paint is pixel-oriented.]
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 3:06 PM on September 12, 2006

This just won an Apple Design Award.

Disclaimer: I work here.
posted by Mikey-San at 5:18 PM on September 12, 2006

Xara Xtreme might be worth looking at. Not free, but not terribly expensive, either.
posted by planetthoughtful at 11:59 PM on September 12, 2006

Jeff, this is gonna sound nuts, but xfig does work under Cygwin. Some way overdetailed instructions here. Doesn't get much more old school than xfig.
posted by Nelson at 12:39 AM on September 13, 2006