Clip art image browser for OSX

[positive_errata]

Hey gang. I have one of those Art Explosion 750,000 image/clipart collections on CD back from OS9 days that I very seldom use, and the reason is because the image browser program doesn't run on OSX and the accompanying catalog is long gone. I went to the company's website (Nova Development), but I don't think there's a free download to upgrade the image browser. When I'm looking for vector clipart, it's extremely unproductive to have to open dozens of files in Illy just to see what they look like. I've tried using Photoshop CS File Browser by checking checking "Render vector images" in Prefs, but I still get nothing but a bunch of thumbnails of the Illustrator file icon - no image previews. I've also tried this in Bridge, but it crashes every time, so I gave up on that.

Any ideas? Anyone know of a different image browsing app I could download and try - one that really can render vector files? I checked Version Tracker a few months ago but didn't find what I was looking for.

Thanks.

[Joe]

I tried this from the Browse command under the file menu in Illustrator and it works fine for me. Of course the browse command in Illy opens Adobe Bridge so if yours in crashing you need to fix that first. Try deleting the Adobe Bridge preferences and see if that helps if it is crashing when you try to browse from Illy.

[almaink]

I had a similar issue and I PDF'ed every eps on the whole CD into one PDF.
I did the same thing with our bitmap Photoshop image CD only I used Photoshops Automate/ PDF Presentation. Now I can not only view the sucker but search it as well and it's at a mouse clicks reach, I never have to load the CD's ever again.

[positive_errata]

May I ask how you PDF'd all the EPS files on the CDs? My CDs each have hundreds of EPS files. And can you describe the search features you mentioned?

Just curious, and unless this is pretty snappy to do I don't think it's worth it for the very few times I use the clipart anyway.

[almaink]

Here's a link about the search feature to get you started lots more if you Google it.
http://www.adobe.com/enterprise/acce.../creating.html
I used "Create PDF from file" in Acrobat to convert all the eps's to PDF. It took a while so I started it and left it running overnight. The Bitmaps CD was easier using the automation feature in Photoshop.

[jennilee]

I ran into this with our Art Explosion also....however, I found that Adobe Bridge (which is part of the suite) works beautifully for this.

[gnubler]

Originally Posted by almaink

I used "Create PDF from file" in Acrobat to convert all the eps's to PDF. It took a while so I started it and left it running overnight. The Bitmaps CD was easier using the automation feature in Photoshop.

I'm trying to do this exact same task: create multi-page PDFs from multiple .eps files on CD. So, in Acrobat I'm doing this: File>Create PDF>From Multiple Files... and then choosing a folder of EPS files to convert. Acrobat launches Distiller and then I immediately get this error:



I've tried different setting in Distiller with the same result. When I look at the Distiller log, there's really nothing there:



Does anyone know what the problem is? Is there another way I can string hundreds of EPS files together into one searchable PDF? Have a better idea?

I'm running OS 10.4.8, Acrobat/Distiller 6.0.2 Pro, and CS2.

[gnubler]

I figured it out: Acrobat was rejecting files names with forward slashes in them ("/"). So I'm running the folders of clipart through R-Name (a very cool freeware file renaming utility) and doing a find and replace of all forward slashes, changing to underscores instead. Now it's working great. No more shuffling through 10 different clipart CDs!

[almaink]

Ya I have issues with tons of legacy files with forward slashes in them. Thats for the application tip. Here's a link to it if anyone wants it.
http://www.tulip.sannet.ne.jp/tayo/