PhotoDraw is a full-featured dual-type (vector and bitmap) graphics software application like
Adobe Fireworks, 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 with
Windows XP, developing
Microsoft Picture It!, as well as creating
Microsoft Office Picture Manager 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, 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 Format 2-D (*.dxf) •
Computer Graphics Metafile (*.cgm) •
Corel Draw (*.cdr) •
Encapsulated Postscript (*.eps) •
Flashpix (*.fpx) •
Graphics Interchange Format (*.gif, *.gfa) •
JPEG File Interchange Format (*.jpg,*jpe,*.jpeg,*.jfif) •
Kodak Photo CD (*.pcd) •
Macintosh PICT (*.pct, *.pict) •
MicroGrafx Designer/Draw (*.drw) • Microsoft Image Composer (*.mic) •
PC Paintbrush (*.pcx) •
Photoshop Files (*.psd) •
Picture It! Format (*.MIX) •
Portable Network Graphics (*.png) •
Tagged Image File Format (*.tif,*.tiff) •
Targa (*.tga) •
Windows Bitmap (*.bmp,*.dib,*rle) •
Windows Metafile (*.wmf) •
Windows Enhanced Metafile (*.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 (*.gif) •
JPEG File Interchange Format (*.jpg) •
PC Paintbrush (*.pcx) • Picture It! 4.0 (*.MIX) • Picture It! 3.0 (*.MIX) • Picture It! 2.0 (*.MIX) •
Portable Network Graphics (*.png) •
Tagged Image File Format (*.tif) •
Targa (*.tga) •
Windows Bitmap (*.bmp) ==Changes in PhotoDraw 2000 Version 2==