Closing unjoined lines??

Hi,

I have absolutely no experience with graphics and I'm practically computer illiterate, so please excuse me if my question seems asinine! I tried Paul Soderholm's guest tutorial (#49) for converting hand drawn sketches to colour vector pictures but got stuck at step 8. This step requires you "punch out" areas and close any unjoined lines. For the life of me, I can not work out how to close the unjoined lines. The tutorial suggests using a shape to close the gap (this bit I've managed), then I have to "add shapes" followed by "break shapes" and finally send the outline and solid filled shape to the back.

Ok - when I "add shapes", what exactly should I have selected? No matter what I do, when I go to "break shapes" it is never an option (ie it is always gray). So I've never gotten past trying to "add shapes".

Can anyone explain it in terms that a 2 yr old could understand (as I think this is probably the level I need)?

Also, is there no way to just close areas with a line?

I am trying to colour-in a picture of a rabbit, which I've attached. I need to make his ears red as it is part of a set of flash cards to teach body parts (I teach English to children in Japan). But one ear is a part of the head and hence gets coloured whatever colour I select for the head.

I apologise for the length of this post - but I've literally been tearing my hair out trying to make this work.

If anyone can help, it would be much appreciated (I'd like to retain at least SOME of my hair!).

Sheri.

Use the shape editor tool to get a rough outline (and make sure you connect the beginning and end points - you will see a + sign)
Keep using that same tool to pull out areas that need to be more rounded and after you choose the red fill set the line width to None.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c2...hapeeditor.jpg

Hi Sheri and welcome,

One of the quickest way to close an open path (convert a line to a shape) is to select one of the two end nodes (control points) and hit Enter. This automatically closes the line and creates a shape.

So in your example, select the left ear, clone it (Ctrl-K) and with the Shape Editor tool, select one of the end points and hit enter. Now set the fill colour to Red and the line (stroke) colour to non, then Ctrl-Shift-B to send it behind the ear shape with a line.

Egg

Egg,

Great tip. THANKS!

Zee

Another tip for Sheri...

Make the new shape a bit transparent (click the wine glass tool a few icons down on the left, and then the slider that appears along the top) - I find it helps me to match the shape.

Echo? We jump in so fast it may even be a pre-echo...

The quickiest way to close selected shape is:
F4, TAB, Enter.

BTW, same for selected shapeS.

Glood tip.

It appears the TAB key for the Shape Editor was left off of the shortcut list in the Help File.

However; it is shown in the movies.