You've seen this effect before, most predominantly in advertising materials in which products need to look shiny and new--the look of an object sitting on a semi-reflective surface. This effect can be created with clever photography or, much more readily, though image manipulation in a program like Adobe Photoshop. But can it be done with vector graphics? It certainly can, and today we'll look at an easy way to create this effect on extruded text in Macromedia Freehand MX.(DigitalMediaNe

Sure you can make Pie Charts with FreeHand 7 or 8 with the Xtra, but it doesn't make the prettiest chart. This tip describes how to make a 3D Pie Chart that takes a little practice at first but yields great results that will leave the Xtra in the dust. This tip can also be used in creating cutouts of other artwork as well.

Ever wonder how to get the best out of FreeHand's GIF export? How to create tileable background GIFs or even transparent, anti-aliased GIFs? Well these series of tips will certainly help with the mysteries.

Soccer balls are not easy to draw, as the shapes that make them up (Black Pentagons and White Hexagons) have to wrap around the ball in a certain pattern. This kind of pattern would normally be impossible to draw flat. While I won't disagree, I will say that you can get it to work if you only create a little bit of the pattern.

This tip will be focusing on the Perspective Grid and how you can create Perspective Drop Shadows. It can be a bit awkward at first because you are going to have to get used to how FreeHand scales objects on the perspective Grid, but hopefully this will help you on that road.

Find out how to make the gradient fill of your dreams. And if that is not enough power, you can still look to blends to help you achieve that professional look. Get these powerful effects working for you in Illustrator and Freehand with Gradient Vector Fills/Blends.