While I'm not a hard-core professional illustrator or cartoonist, I do use vector design tools almost every day. Designing logos, playing with type, and creating quick layouts are things every vector design tool should do well.
Adobe Illustrator CS3, of course, is the 800-pound gorilla in this field, and it's my tool of choice. But there are plenty of people who don't need the extensive functionality that Illustrator provides. Plus, Illustrator is something of a resource hog (right now, it's using 176MB of real memory and 1.21GB of virtual memory on my system).
Today, I'm going to review four leaner, lower-cost (or free) options from four high-powered indie Mac developers: DrawBerry, EazyDraw, Lineform, and VectorDesigner. Unlike Illustrator, all of these use Mac OS X's built-in Core Image foundation, which makes them very easy to compare to each other.
It's high noon for vector apps, after the jump.
