Making object shape conform to raster visual edges

Long time!

So I was looking back at this post to create some "art" from photos-

http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthre...aitphoto/page2

An important step is to manually draw around and cut out your subject, so that later, say, you can fill just the subject area with a splatter or watercolor fill.

This was a xara tutorial from many product versions ago.

In dealing with with shapes defined by background and foreground (i.e., black human silhouette against white background), is there a newer way to get xara to define the foreground shape automatically based on color, and not have to draw around?

For example, you have a model with lots of hair. The model is all silhouette, the background is white. It would be difficult to draw around all that hair. And this is what some "knockout" or "isolation plugins" are for. Yet-- they still just visually get rid of the background (make it null or invisible), and the actual xara shape of the object is still a rectangle defined by the original photo.

Is there a newer way to make the main object the new xara shape automatically using color differences?? This is so that when applying a fill, the fill would only fill (affect) the foreground shape, not the while rectangle of foreground+background

Thanks

Yes in the newer version there is a mask painter tool and an eraser tool which used together will give you the result you want. See the videos below. They should help enplane the process. Sorry I just can't seem to get the hang of making them show here.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mM1TdS2z0m0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPU98RcV6J0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOJWNOzsk1A

Larry-thanks.

I've seen those before, and they're great.

Only problem is that, as far as I can tell, this process knocks out the background, but the shape is ~still a rectangle~

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mM1TdS2z0m0

See the very end of the video where the man's picture is selected, and the drag handles are at the corners. Even though the background is now invisible (the wall part), the object is technically still a rectangular object, and if you fill it, not only will it fill the man's torso, but it will fill the entire rectangle.

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Sorry I just can't seem to get the hang of making them show here.

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Hi Larry just use youtube opening & closing tags with the end youtube url characters inbetween, the bit after ?v=

Hi Tallis,

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Only problem is that, as far as I can tell, this process knocks out the background, but the shape is ~still a rectangle~

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That's correct. However Big Franks tutorial uses bitmaps right up to the trace step, so there's nothing stopping you using the method Larry has suggested to cut out part of the photo as opposed to tracing around it with the shape editor tool. It only becomes a vector object once you insert the trace.

Egg, thanks.

And that's the crux of my question- I want that foreground shape as vector, but without having to manually draw. I guess I'm wondering if there's a way to "automate" the tracing step by using the color differences or knockout as a way to define the vector shape as the foreground object alone.

Hi Tallis, I think you're getting confused between tracing & tracing ;)

No seriously, Big Franks tutorial suggests you trace around the face image (using the Shape editor tool) to isolate it from the background. I'm just saying that you can also use the Mask/Erase option that Larry suggests to do this as an alternative means.

The real trace, using the Bitmap tracer (rather than using the shape editor tool to draw around the face) is what really converts the image into a vector.

So meaning of trace type 1 = Draw around the face with the shape editor tool to create a vector shape filled with a bitmap

And trace type 2 = Selecting an image and using the Bitmap Tracer tool to convert it to vector.

So the two "traces" have confusing & different meanings :(

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Originally Posted by Egg Bramhill

However Big Franks tutorial uses bitmaps right up to the trace step

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I think that's what you will need to do also. After you use the method described above to remove the background make a final bitmap copy do to the trace. That way the trace will only see the bitmap without the background. If you don't the bitmap trace will still see the background. The results you get will depend largely on the bitmap trace settings used. Even then it may yield unsatisfactory results.
But you can get photographic results. Black Panther once posted his settings to yield fantastic results but I do not have them any longer, I wish I did. At any rate after you get something you are happy with make sure you select all the objects and, there will be many, so group them. If there's a way to "automate" the tracing step I don't know what it is.

thank you both for doing a tag team intervention here, i think my brain may have gotten closer to what the concept is...

i wonder what those black panther settings were