Xara Xchanges (1)

[ivan louette]

For those who could be interested by the exchanges between Xara X and other programs I will post some ideas.

Here I have used the ability of Flash bitmap tracer (excellent!) to trace the bitmaps at the pixel level. My Flash version is 4.0 but it works also with older ones.

One of the Xara forum .gif smileys was imported into Flash and traced with the following settings :

Color threshold : 10
minimum area : 1 pixel
Curve Fit : Pixels
Corner Threshold : Many corners

Then, the result was copied and pasted into Xara X as a Windows Metafile (flash can place vector WMF in the Windows clipboard) ; and modified afterwards with bevels, transparency and shadows.

Enjoy it,
ivan

[ivan louette]

Disintegrate it!

[Klaus Nordby]

Brilliant, Ivan!

So, Flash's tracer can trace pixel's exactly? That's got to be a first, as all other tracers I have seen (Adobe's and Corel's) are quite unreliable.

K
www.xaraxone.com/FeaturedArt/kn/
www.klausnordby.com/xara

[gwpriester]

That is really cool Ivan.

Does Flash have any settings to smoothe the trace if you are tracing a photo or some other bitmap image?

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

<a href="http://www.gwpriester.com">
www.gwpriester.com </a>


XaraXone

[RAMWolff44]

Is it big $$ or affordable, under $100.00?? [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_eek.gif[/img]

I want one!!! Something I have been looking for 4ever!!!

Richard [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif[/img]

---Wolff On The Prowl---

[ivan louette]

Klaus, I also use Streamline 4 for some of its abilities and I used Corel Trace in the past. The latter can do interesting things too (like some kinds of mosaic), but it's uncredibly slow!

Gary, yes Flash can nicely and easily smooth the trace of bitmaps like photographs. Then I use its .ai export function and re-import the results into Xara because wmf cut and paste doesnt use bézier curves and replace them by zillions of straight lines. But sometimes the imported .ai file from Flash doesn't react correctly in Xara X.

RamWolff, I must say that I only use Flash as a complementary tool. I don't know its pricing now but I think it's more expensive than Xara X. Nevertheless I have thought that a lot of Xara's forum users also use Flash for what it has been created : vector animation. And thus they could be interested to know something about other "symbiotic" uses.

Kindly,
ivan

[Gaussian]

Really nice Ivan and thanks for sharing this with us.

[Egg Bramhill]

I've had Flash 4 for over 3 years and never knew it could trace bitmaps!!!
I've been playing around with it using a photograph of my wife & myself. I'll post the trace first. In the following 2 attachments I've only used a small section covering my left eye.

[Egg Bramhill]

.

[Egg Bramhill]

....again the left eye but with a 20 step contour applied and a shadow. The image is actually 2 images, the left side having a greater shadow depth.
Thanks again Ivan.
Egg