AI and pattern editing

[klingler]

Folks,

I'm in that learning curve where I'm struggling to learn how to use Adobe Illustrator (CS3) to create good quality carve-able patterns. I've searched the forum looking for some sort of tutorial on the subject, but have found nothing that get's too deep. I have a basic understanding of the Live Trace feature, but it's not giving me the detail I'm looking for. Thanks folks.

[www.go3d.us]

AI has a unique feature called gradient mesh. You might want to take a closer look at that.

Good luck!

[bjbethke]

Folks,

I'm in that learning curve where I'm struggling to learn how to use Adobe Illustrator (CS3) to create good quality carve-able patterns. I've searched the forum looking for some sort of tutorial on the subject, but have found nothing that get's too deep. I have a basic understanding of the Live Trace feature, but it's not giving me the detail I'm looking for. Thanks folks.

I don’t have CS3, The ones I have used are CS2 and I just got CS4 around the first of this year. They work about the same, a few more extras in the newer ones.

I found a few You-Tube videos that aren’t too bad for learning, I download the Videos in a Flash file and review the from time to time, (I use the Movavi Flash converter It works great for me) and it was free at the time I downloaded it, it is about $29.99 now - maybe?

The Draw and the live trace are good function, also learn how to use layers to add Grayscale gradients – try to make them look like the pattern images you get when you use the scanning probe.

Here are three of them you may want to look at. Hope this helps.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DzpT8POAME

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MOlYMVTnJY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0yNFH99cWg

[klingler]

Thanks guys, I just had a chance to go through those videos. Good stuff. I'm sure it will take me some time to get used to, but I'll get it!

[robbrigg2]

Folks,

I'm in that learning curve where I'm struggling to learn how to use Adobe Illustrator (CS3) to create good quality carve-able patterns. I've searched the forum looking for some sort of tutorial on the subject, but have found nothing that get's too deep. I have a basic understanding of the Live Trace feature, but it's not giving me the detail I'm looking for. Thanks folks.

What are you trying to use for your patterns? Pictures or gif's? Illutrator is good but I have found that to get the most detail from a pattern I need to make a large scale file in AI and then import it into Photoshop (regardless of weather it s a picture or a graphic. I then convert the file to greyscale, and save it as .png file. if there are ridges I go back and resave the fil with a 1.0 Guassian Blur wich flattens the image some. I only us the blur if the image dose has the spike one import into designer.

If you have a file you want to start with, and would like me to walk you through the steps I use I would be more than happy to do so just send me an email and we can go from there.

Robert (robbrigg2@aol.com)

[klingler]

Wonderful Robert. The files I'm working with are b/w images. I'll send you one and you tell me what you think. I've done some messing with it and was able to get something better than what I started with, but it's not what I want it to look like.

Thanks,

[dbfletcher]

Any chance you can post the image here... and then robert can explain his steps and we can all follow along? This could turn out to be a very educational thread. Perhaps users of inkscape or Corel will chime in with how to get the same results for each step? I'm invisioning each step be clearly labeled by a number and each step also be in its own post within the thread. Additionally the starting image and the completed image or each step attached as a thumbnails.

What do you think Robert... are you up for it?

Doug Fletcher

[robbrigg2]

Any chance you can post the image here... and then robert can explain his steps and we can all follow along? This could turn out to be a very educational thread. Perhaps users of inkscape or Corel will chime in with how to get the same results for each step? I'm invisioning each step be clearly labeled by a number and each step also be in its own post within the thread. Additionally the starting image and the completed image or each step attached as a thumbnails.

What do you think Robert... are you up for it?

Doug Fletcher

I have no problem with that. I have Corel 8 (old but effective) and some others I will do what I can and hopefully it will help

[klingler]

Here's the picture I'm working on... and one of my attempts to get a good pattern from it. Not exactly the outcome I'm looking for.

Edit - Sorry, the trace attempt didn't convert to jpg very well when I uploaded it.

[Steven Alford]

your second picture is solid black.

[klingler]

Yeah... it's not solid black when I open it on my pc... let me try again. This time I converted it to jpg before I uploaded it.

[robbrigg2]

John

Here is what I have. Don't know if you can make out the details from this picture or not, but I am uploading the mpc to mediafire.com

[robbrigg2]

HEre is the link to the Ptn file.... if the pattern conversion is to people's liking I will write a step by step direction for doing this on your own. It is easy, though this file was a bit of a challenge because of the dot shadding that was used on it.

http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=1e8667e1e63d955fd6baebe61b361f7ce04e75f6 e8ebb871

[klingler]

The dot shading is why I believe I wasn't able to get something better as well. It would require a lot of manual 'correcting' to get it where it should be. From what I can tell, the mpc looks like what I was comging up with.

When I get home this afternoon, I'll take a closer look at it... Thanks Robert.

[robbrigg2]

Here are the steps to working with a picture like the one you had of the tractor.

1. Import the picture into Adobe Photoshop. (It is easier to use this program for creating a usable file then AI. Sometime I use AI to make the original source but I always bring it into PS to convert it to a PNG file).

2. Convert the file to Grayscale
a. Go to the top and select Image then Mode then Grayscale

3. Increase the size of the image
a. Under the Image Heading select Image Size

b. Make the Resolution 300

c. Make the file approx. 5”x5” (this is big but the bigger the better where Designer is concerned).

4. Delete the white from the background of the image.

a. Select the magic Eraser tool

i. This is on the left side of the screen (should be) and it is under the Eraser tool. It has a star next to an eraser.

ii. This tool will delete whatever color you select so click on the white of the background and it should all go away (or most of it)

iii. Touch any other spots of white that you can see that you want gone.

5. Now add a new layer for the background

a. Go to the heading “Layer” click it and then click “New”

b. ON the right you will see two layers one is the image, the other is the blank layer you just added. Make sure that the image layer is listed first by dragging and dropping it into place. Touch the blank image layer and add color through the paint bucket tool on the left. Use a bright color.

i. If you do this right you will see your image on top of the color you just added, you will also see little dots of black and grey that were in the white field but did not get deleted by the magic eraser.

6. Erase the little black dots with the regular eraser tool

a. Make sure that you activate the picture layer first so that you actually delete the black spots. If done right the color layer you added should not be affected.

b. Go through and delete all of the spots on what was once the white background that you can see.

7. Add Gaussian Blur

a. To do this select Filter from the top and then Blur and Then Gaussian Blur.

b. For your image I had to use a 2.0 blur but normally I use 1.0 and sometime less. The more blur the less of the details. But it will belnd to a degree all of the spot shading in an image.

8. Now save the File as a .png file (select File Save as and do the drop down to select a Png toward the bottom of the list).

9. Import the file into designer

a. When you get it into designer apply it to a blank project board. The line around the edge should look normal if you see a bunch of round spots like partial drills holes go back to your picture in APS and delete the spots in the area that is affect. You should be able to find them if you use the microscope in that area, use the eraser and get rid of all of them that you can find.

b. Import it again, continue to do this until you get clean lines.

10. This file took me about 30 minutes so it is relatively easy to do it just takes patience. You can spend more time and you will get even better results. Understand though that some files are simply to cluttered to use, but they can be reworked in a more artistic fashion and you still can get great results.

I hope this helps. Please ask any other questions you are unsure of and I will do my best to explain or answer them more fully.

[Steven Alford]

Here are the steps to working with a picture like the one you had of the tractor.

1. Import the picture into Adobe Photoshop. (It is easier to use this program for creating a usable file then AI. Sometime I use AI to make the original source but I always bring it into PS to convert it to a PNG file).

2. Convert the file to Grayscale
a. Go to the top and select Image then Mode then Grayscale

3. Increase the size of the image
a. Under the Image Heading select Image Size

b. Make the Resolution 300

c. Make the file approx. 5”x5” (this is big but the bigger the better where Designer is concerned).

4. Delete the white from the background of the image.

a. Select the magic Eraser tool

i. This is on the left side of the screen (should be) and it is under the Eraser tool. It has a star next to an eraser.

ii. This tool will delete whatever color you select so click on the white of the background and it should all go away (or most of it)

iii. Touch any other spots of white that you can see that you want gone.

5. Now add a new layer for the background

a. Go to the heading “Layer” click it and then click “New”

b. ON the right you will see two layers one is the image, the other is the blank layer you just added. Make sure that the image layer is listed first by dragging and dropping it into place. Touch the blank image layer and add color through the paint bucket tool on the left. Use a bright color.

i. If you do this right you will see your image on top of the color you just added, you will also see little dots of black and grey that were in the white field but did not get deleted by the magic eraser.

6. Erase the little black dots with the regular eraser tool

a. Make sure that you activate the picture layer first so that you actually delete the black spots. If done right the color layer you added should not be affected.

b. Go through and delete all of the spots on what was once the white background that you can see.

7. Add Gaussian Blur

a. To do this select Filter from the top and then Blur and Then Gaussian Blur.

b. For your image I had to use a 2.0 blur but normally I use 1.0 and sometime less. The more blur the less of the details. But it will belnd to a degree all of the spot shading in an image.

8. Now save the File as a .png file (select File Save as and do the drop down to select a Png toward the bottom of the list).

9. Import the file into designer

a. When you get it into designer apply it to a blank project board. The line around the edge should look normal if you see a bunch of round spots like partial drills holes go back to your picture in APS and delete the spots in the area that is affect. You should be able to find them if you use the microscope in that area, use the eraser and get rid of all of them that you can find.

b. Import it again, continue to do this until you get clean lines.

10. This file took me about 30 minutes so it is relatively easy to do it just takes patience. You can spend more time and you will get even better results. Understand though that some files are simply to cluttered to use, but they can be reworked in a more artistic fashion and you still can get great results.

I hope this helps. Please ask any other questions you are unsure of and I will do my best to explain or answer them more fully.


On this color that you add to the new layer, do you want it to remain as part of the png that you create? I thought you needed a "blank" background in order to get a good pattern? Should you not delete it after you get all the black specs removed? Basically giving you a transparency.

[robbrigg2]

On this color that you add to the new layer, do you want it to remain as part of the png that you create? I thought you needed a "blank" background in order to get a good pattern? Should you not delete it after you get all the black specs removed? Basically giving you a transparency.

Good catch.. no, each time you import the file into designer you want to delete the color layer first. It only serves as a way to isolate the dots without changing the picture.... sorry I guess I missed that step.

[Steven Alford]

Thanks for the info.

[klingler]

Great directions. This will help quite a bit. Thanks Robert!

[robbrigg2]

No problem at all. I love to help. Don't hesitate to tell me if I can be of assistance later.