Sketch 3
Improve your digital designs
£55 Developer Bohemian Coding, bohemiancoding.com/sketch OS OS X 10.8 or later Requires 64-bit processor, iOS device, Wi-Fi for mirroring
Sketch 2 was an impressive, if slightly flawed, vector graphics tool aimed at interface designers. With Sketch 3, the app truly comes of age, refining what was there and adding important time-saving features.
It’s immediately apparent how much faster Sketch 3 is. This is primarily down to tweaks made to the context-based inspector that ditches irritating sliding panels for a more considered layout. Efficiency is further cemented by alignment buttons and the object search field being permanently displayed.
However, the big draw is the addition of symbols, layer styles and text styles. Any object or group can be converted into a symbol, and any change to one instance affects the others. For items that share appearance but not content, layer styles enable similar consistency. Text styles work the same for copy, almost mirroring CSS in web design wireframes. Interfaces and management throughout are intuitive and responsive.
But that’s not all. Several UI app templates are now built in. Bitmaps can be cropped, a ‘presentation’ mode takes just the canvas full-screen, and export is ludicrously powerful.
Existing users might grumble that this is an entirely new Mac App Store app, with a price-tag to match. We’d argue it remains great value, given the new features. Craig Grannell An excellent product for new and existing users alike. Ideally suited to interface designers.
Symbols and layer/text styles
More efficient interface
Hugely powerful export
Zooming is still flaky