Drunk looking fine lines... any ideas??

[Cutting Cathy]

Last weekend I started working on my Christmas themed magnets to give as gifts to friends and co-workers. I visited many stained glass and coloring page websites as I had read you can use those patterns for intarsia. I actually found some nice ones to use, but..... (there I go again with the but again) the lines were so thick!! Too much room for error when cutting!! While in chat one night it was suggested that I trace them using a fine line. Well I never new how hard that was!!! I tried tracing them with a light box and it looks like I was drunk when I did it!! I thought I would go ahead and try them and big mistake!!! Where my lines wobbled, I tried to even it out.... need I say more?!?!?! Of course pieces wouldn't fit worth a darn. So I tried cutting exactly with the line and ... yep looks like I was drunk cutting it!! If you look at the attachments, you will see what I mean!!

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I have Inkscape and also CorelDraw, but haven't used either. Does anyone know if they are capable of helping me with getting finer lines?? Both programs are almost overwhelming to me when I look at them!! If not does anyone have any other ideas how I can get thinner lines without the drunken look?? Thanks for looking and any help!!!!

[Chris "The Wood Artist"]

I sometimes use my rapidresizer program to do what you are wanting to do. It has an option to make outlines and make the lines thinner. It works great. Now I know on inkscape there is a way to do this also, I just don't know how, you may look in the tutors on here or also go here www.scrollsawvilliage.com. Travis has a tutor for inkscape on there in the villiage university thread.

[lucky788scroller]

Cathy, it sounds like you just might as well give up! Just throw in the towel now, sell your scrollsaws, and just go back to cookin, cleanin, and doin dishes!
Seriously though, why not leave the lines how they were, and start cutting from there?As you cut each piece, trace that one against the next piece, and use that as your critical cut line, and uniformly cut through the fatter lines. That way each piece follows the previous one. Homer Bishop had a good thread on here describing the method he uses for cutting intarsia, and if done that way, the line weight doesnt really effect the final piece. Its better than cookin and cleanin isnt it?

[jim_mex]

Hi Cathy - if you can hang on a few days I'll help you out of your mess. I'm just working on a small video tutorial to show folks how to trace simple patterns for intarsia and segmentation using a vector illustrating program. I use a program called Xara Xtreme but Inkscape and Coreldraw are very similar.

To explain as simply as I can why it pays to draw in these programs

Illustrating programs - as opposed to photoediting programs such as Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro - are not pixel based. The lines or shapes you draw are called vectors which means they are formed as the result of a mathematical equation calculated between points you laydown on your drawing area (or screen). For example if I place two points on the screen the program calculates a straight line between the two points and no matter how much I magnify that line it will still look like a straight line and not a bunch of raggedy pixels.

The neat trick that vector programs then allow you to do is to bend those lines from each point by pulling on 'handles'.

Tracing an image becomes not much more than importing it into your illustrating program, creating a transparent layer on top of it -just like placing tracing paper over an actual image - and then drawing vector lines on this layer as a series of point from which you push and pull thes elines into curves to copy the shape of the image underneath.

The beauty about all of these vector illustrating programs is once you learn how to manipulate these points and lines you can draw almost anything.

Furthermore you can set the line thickness to any size you like. If you wish to magnify a vector drawing by for example 400% the line size will also increase 400% but to get it back to its original size you just tell the program to reset it. Because of this facility your original image can be as small or as large as you wish. if its tiny you simple magnify the screen size and trace it at its original size and when finished you can scale up to whatever size you like. Does this make sense? Probably not much - so take a look at this animation which shows how to copy a simple shape

Flash Animation

Whilst you are waiting for my tutorial use the help file in either Inkscape or Coreldraw and learn how to draw lines and convert them to curves as I did in my animation. Once you master this technique you are well on the way to producing perfect scaleable fine lined patterns - and it really is simple!

Thinks - another mess I'm getting myself into with Cathy!

[jim_mex]

Morning! - For anyone who saw my animation last night (thursday) I've just corrected a couple of errors. You may need to refresh your browser to see the updated version - the new text is now in a reddish brown colour.

Sorry, didn't want to confuse cathy - LOL!

[Anneh]

Another great tutorial! Thanks Jim - you're awesome! I have learned so much from you and everyone else here on board who takes the time to explain and show things! Thanks so much and I'm looking forward to your next tutorial.
Anne

[KtownScroller]

Perfect animation tutorial Jim. That's how I do it using Corel Draw. I did this Bills helmet using that exact technique.

You can do it Cathy with a little patience. Steve Good has some nice Corel Draw tutorials on YouTube (YouTube - Tracing clipart with Corel Draw).

Of course you could ask for some help. I could do one or two of them for you. Post a few pictures and I'll see what I can do.

Right click the pictures for an enlarged view.

[Bluebird]

@ Jim: Ohhhh that's what you meant by "vector illustrating program! I use Pattern Wizard to trace on top of my pictures, it works similar to what you show Jim except you don't have to bend the lines to make curves. PW makes the curves as you go
I recommend you give it a try. Very very simple to use and to "master". You can download a trial version of the program to try it before purchasing it. After 30 minutes of using it, I adopted it! It seems to me it would be easier to use PW on more complex pattern then Corel draw, but I have never tried Corel?!

@Rick, your helmet looks gorgeous!

[normded]

Go Bills !!!!! And take the Bisons with you. lol

disgruntled Fan ( i miss Jim Kelly)
Jerry

[jim_mex]

Hi Henri - there's nothing wrong at all with Pattern Wizard also.

The reason I use and extremely biased towards Xara Xtreme is because i happened upon an early version of the program about 10 years back called Corelxara when Corel marketed the program - it was actually developed in the UK and Corel picked up a lot of ideas from it which were actually used for CorelDraw. - and I've gone with it since and even though i've used the better known names such as Coreldraw and Illustrator, and Freehand before, for what i do Xara Xtreme knocks the spots off them.

For example, I don't want to confuse Cathy but I tend to draw in shapes rather than lines and on multiple layers so I can then print them off separately for intarsia style cuttings. I can also colour them or fill them with wood textures to get an idea of the finished appearance and can even extrude the parts to get an idea of shaping. Additionally I use Xtreme for all my graphic resizing work, building these cute animations, laying out simple publicity work, designing web graphics including rollover buttons, as well as full blown illustrating such as you would do in programs such as Illustrator and CorelDraw. For me the program is a Swiss army knife, compact, easy to learn, realtively cheap and lightening fast. Ok, maybe overkill for pattern making but if you go to a little trouble to learn such a packet it saves you having a heap of other software for everytime you want to switch tasks. I can't praise this program enough!

Having said this, and done my sales pitch, any vector illustrating program will give similar results for what Cathy wants and if she has access to a couple already I'd say go with them. Just learn the technique of manipulating lines and shapes and you are almost home.

It seems to me it would be easier to use PW on more complex pattern then Corel draw, but I have never tried Corel?

I'm not sure about that Henri. I have also used quite a few programs in a similar fashion and all seem to have drawbacks. The only thing i would say against Coreldraw and Illustrator is that they can be daunting programs for a newbie to learn because they have a pretty cluttered and complex interface with lots of bells and whistles. This is where programs like Xtreme and Inkscape win out - they have a limited number of tools and its manipulation of these which give all the effects these programs can produce. Its my view that they also teach you to use your brain and not just another panel of preset effects. As an example, for Sarah's magpie design which I've recently redrawn i tried to convert it direct with several programs and didn't like what I ended up with. In the end i went back to Xtreme and knocked out a perfect line drawing in a little under 40 mins, which ain't bad going for the complexity of the design. Again, its what I'm used to and to me drawing in these programs is a piece of cake - ouch! did that sound a bit pompous - it wasn't meant to! -I mean to say, I find it so easy!


@Rick - sorry pal but I can't abide American Football. Nevertheless that's a real cool helmet! Yet again, thanks for supporting my comments