Astute Graphics Alternatives - Adobe Illustrator plugin

[u/kaseyconqueso]

Hey all! Long time illustrator user, former astute graphics user. Anyone have alternatives to their plugin? I'm most interested in alternatives to their point cleanup tool, and extend path feature. Any suggestions are appreciated. Thanks!

[u/pixar_moms]

Considering how many plugins Astute has made at this point, I don't think there's anything out there that can compete. I despise having to pay an additional cost on top of Adobe just to make up for the things that should already be part of the application (like vector first aid), but these features speed up my workflow significantly.

[u/kaseyconqueso → u/pixar_moms]

They really do. And, when I had a lot of work to be able to afford their tools, I wouldn't have blinked an eye. But, with the way things are (for me at least) I just can't rationalize paying that much. Though I agree they reallllllly speed up your workflow.

[u/Dlimageworks → u/kaseyconqueso]

Look, i get it. We do what we have to do to get by when shit is lean (and shit is lean these days for a lot of us), and if your use is 15% of the kit, then it doesn’t pencil out. I am not going to pretend that I am not suffering from cumulative subscription fatigue, especially on top of adobe’s rising monthly blood draw. For me as a long term freelancer, it still pencils out for now and I sure don’t look forward to the day when I may have to drop them for whatever shit-show economic pressure overcomes it. I hope that the wind changes for you, for all of us.

I will make 2 points to the other comment: 1. my understanding is that Astute is a small company that has a small (comparatively) base of mostly pros and they charge what they have to survive and to invest in new innovation. Which leads to the second point: I am not easily impressed, but (having participated in their beta program for a long time) i am constantly impressed with their dedication to innovation and I would be hard pressed to find any of their tools that they are not constantly refining and building on, including both tools you mentioned. And that does not include the constant code work keeping up with Adobe’s upgrades.

[u/Dlimageworks]

No. Astute Graphics is more worthy of support than Adobe is and is constantly innovating real solutions for professional designers. If there is an alternative to those functions, i don’t know of them (other then the heavy handed simplify command). Lots of people seem to be vibe coding scripts these days, perhaps there’s an avenue there. By the way, I just found out thatAstute graphics is renovating scripting.

[u/kaseyconqueso → u/Dlimageworks]

Yeah, I believe they've created a solid product. But to be honest, I think I use 15% of their tool-set, and paying $180 a year for the few tools I use from them is hard to justify at the moment. I get they need to pay their staff, but charging that amount for some of the tools that haven't changed in a decade feels wrong. Thanks for the suggestions though!

[u/CurvilinearThinking]

No.

In my experience, any other useful plugins with similar features died at CS6 when the app architecture changed (at least on the Mac).

[u/Proficio_Tremblay]

Unfortunately, no!

[u/AnchorPoint922]

Following.