Professor Tassel

[Truroneil]

To Whom It May concern:

I've been away. I've been oppressed and depressed by the images and impact of terrorism. I'm home. I need to draw. I need Xara and its forums again.

I decided to use my alter ego - Professor Tassel which I drew for college papers when I taught at the Nova Scotia Teachers College. Here he is celebrating our return home after two weeks on the West Coast. Seattle, Washington State and British Columbia were beautiful, but the clouds of terrorism darkened our visit and we're glad to be home.

The bitmap tracer seemed to take some of the colours out of the face and hands. Haven't figured out yet how to fix his "cloudy complexion." Any suggestions ?

Cheers, Neil

[Truroneil]

To Whom It May concern:

I've been away. I've been oppressed and depressed by the images and impact of terrorism. I'm home. I need to draw. I need Xara and its forums again.

I decided to use my alter ego - Professor Tassel which I drew for college papers when I taught at the Nova Scotia Teachers College. Here he is celebrating our return home after two weeks on the West Coast. Seattle, Washington State and British Columbia were beautiful, but the clouds of terrorism darkened our visit and we're glad to be home.

The bitmap tracer seemed to take some of the colours out of the face and hands. Haven't figured out yet how to fix his "cloudy complexion." Any suggestions ?

Cheers, Neil

[Ross Macintosh]

Welcome back Neil!

If you used the tracer to input the Prof you seem to be getting pretty good results. If some of your black lines seem washed out try making a bitmap copy of the just the black&white work and overlay it (perhaps on a layer above??) onto the trace result. Give the bitmap copy stained glass transparency and see if helps darken the lines. If it does you can clone the bitmap to further enhance the darkening effect.

Also remember that if you overlay colour on your linework you can set those colour-filled shapes to have stained glass transparency with the Transparency shape set to 'none'. That will keep your black lines black without the colours modifying them.

Regards, Ross

<a href=http://www.designstop.com/>DesignStop.Com</a>

[Truroneil]

Thanks, Ross. Actually, I drew the Prof and scanned it into Picture Publisher. Colored it there. Imported into Xara and did a bitmap tracing. It came out well except for the skin tones. I drew the grass and leaves in Xara and used the fractal clouds for the sky. Needed to do something light! Thanks for your comments, and its nice to read and see the work and the forums. Neil

[Egg Bramhill]

Great image. I'm amazed you managed to get such a clean image from the bitmap tracer! My guess is that the face is not a closed shape(in fact the lines making up the face would be shapes), therefore when you added the fractal background fill it applied to the face as well. The hands do appear to have a fill which is'nt the same as the fractal fill.
See attachment.
Egg

[Truroneil]

Egg,
Thanks. You are right on. When I draw with on paper, I often have unattached lines; when, I go to add colours on the computer, I have to enlarge and close them. Missed the two in Tassel's hairline around the ear. The hands seem a little greener than intended. Not completely happy finding skin tones. Thanks again, Cheers, Neil

[Truroneil]

With tips from my friends, skin colour has been improved. Thanks. On reflection, he should have a bottle of Molson's Light, Clancey's or a Guiness in his hand. Neil

[Egg Bramhill]

Glad I could help, he definetly looks healthier now. Could you kindly explain how you managed to get such a good trace? Can you remeber the settings?
Egg

[caraman1]

I always get great results using the bitmap tracer! My settings are min area=15, accuracy=80 & smoothing=15

I always have to remove extra nodes but Xara always does a great job.

My latest is attached

Dennis

<a href=http://www.djart.com>DJArt & Design</a>

[ajreed]

Dennis - your style (barber) reminds me of an artist I remember from MAD magazine, Dan or Don somebody.

Can anybody help? Its very frustrating.

Was it Don Martin?

Alan