Vector Art Mega Collection Version 2

[sc.crab]

I have Vector Art Mega Collection Version 1 and was wondering if version 2 was different or was it basically the same as version 1 ?

[Brady Watson]

It's the same; only different.

-B

[steve_g]

“The same only different” is a good description… How many different pin striping variations do you need? Also, we have so many good fonts available to us that more in a vector format is unnecessary.
I was disappointed in the offerings and didn’t buy #3.
SG

[Brady Watson]

If you want ready to go vector designs, then any of them are good for that purpose. The nice thing about the VAMC is that it has a paper book/catalog that you can thumb through. This is a lot easier than doing it on the computer. It's good for noobs starting out, schools and when you need something artsy fartsy to embellish something really quickly. I almost always draw my own stuff, so it isn't a big deal - but there are occasions when it is nice to have some quick designs around for trinkets to give to friends, and you can let them pick out a design instead of trying to hone your mind reading skills.

-B

[steve_g]

Brady feels like the printed catalog is a plus… Here’s another opinion.
The images aren’t digitally searchable by name, subject or anything. This means that you or your customers have to manually go through and look at everything to see if something or parts of several somethings might work. The customer can never make up their mind on the spot or don’t have the time right now, and want to take your only catalog home to study it more. This means that you don’t have your catalog when another customer wants to look at it!
I’ve found it easiest to do a Google image search by name, topic or theme to narrow down what their wants are. Now you can either take ideas from several quickly found images or buy the one they fell in love with.
This is just the way that seems to work for me.
SG

[Roy Harding]

I put my catalog up on a password protected Google Drive site. If the customer is interested, I give them the password - they download the .PDF, and can search to their hearts' content.

[Brady Watson]

Brady feels like the printed catalog is a plus…

Yes...but I didn't say anything about using it for my customers. I find it the easiest thing for...

...occasions when it is nice to have some quick designs around for trinkets to give to friends, and you can let them pick out a design instead of trying to hone your mind reading skills.

I don't have retail customers - but I can see where it would be useful for those who do, or are into the 'trinket' business. Large corporations, architects and designers worth their salt already know what they want...and customers who would be happy with a design everybody & their brother could use isn't my clientele.

Overall though, the VAMC is a high quality set of vector artwork - as far as vector clipart goes. The designs import cleanly into just about any CAD/CAM package (EPS ones do anyway) and if I recall only 1 or 2 designs in the whole book had a rogue node or two that had to be cleaned up. I have nothing bad to say about the product at all from a quality standpoint. Whether it make business sense or not to use it with your customers is a totally different line of thought.

-B

[steve_g]

Roy…
Is the catalog PDF something that’s offered now or something you took the time to put together?

Brady…
I have to agree with you as to the quality of the vectors and artwork. When I was first starting out It was a valuable asset, nowadays I find I can create my own faster than searching.
SG

[scottp55]

For us "Newbies" What are you designing in that is "faster than searching"? Currently proving a slow learner at Adobe Illustrator and several others(also proved slow at Corel Draw). anything as intuitive as Vectric?

[steve_g]

Scott...
Recent examples are Stage props… A castle wall, a carriage, trees & shrubs and a spinning wheel. In each example I sent clipped images from a Google search to get a basic feel of what they wanted. One resulted in an image purchased while the rest were assembled from what was “liked” from several images.
I’ll try to get some photos… I deliver them as pink foam and often don’t see the end product.
SG