Carved in Stone -- A Mini-tutorial

[gwpriester]

Here's a mini-tutorial for creating a chiselled stone effect.

Let me know if anything is not clear or if anything needs to be changed. Nothing here is carved in stone (har har har).

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

Be It Even So Humble...

[gwpriester]

Here's a mini-tutorial for creating a chiselled stone effect.

Let me know if anything is not clear or if anything needs to be changed. Nothing here is carved in stone (har har har).

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

Be It Even So Humble...

[Ross Macintosh]

I'll continue the mini-tutorial theme by telling how I did my carved slate look. This one isn't likely to be as clear as Gary's but here goes anyways...

I've posted a zoomed image below that I hope clarifies these tips.

I started out by drawing a rectangle with no line colour and a dark grey fill. I converted it to an editable shape and then used the freehand tool to modify its edge to be less rectilinear. I cloned the shape, sent it to back, resized it bigger, edited its shape slightly, and changed its fill to be a fractal plasma fill comprised of two tones of grey. I then selected the original shape and gave it a slight feather. To make it look more like stone I cloned the top shape, filled it white, and gave it a linear transparency. That transparency added a gentle highlight to the lower part of the stone. That was cloned and the transparency changed to eliptical. It was positioned to provide a slightly diagonal highlight - again quite transparent for a gentle effect. To finish the stone I cloned the furthermost back (larger) shape filling it solid black and then using ctrl-shift-b repeatedly to position it directly above the backmost shape. Applying a linear transparency, it was possible to add a shadowing effect to the edge of the stone. I then cloned that shape, sent it to back and then applied a drop shadow to look like the stone was casting a shadow. I then grouped the whole bunch. It was the stone.

Next I zoomed in, and using the freehand tool, I drew dozens of fine scratch lines. These were a lighter grey colour and I applied transparency to get them just right. I tried to mix long strokes with some short ones. Using the same colour I then applied text. It was then beveled to give the engraved look. I used a lot of contrast and a light angle as if light was coming from above. The elevation was set to something like 30 degrees.

The image was finished off with a background. Like a good boy I posted it to the forum hoping it might give someone ideas.

I hope that wasn't too hard to follow. I should note that I've noticed that any grungy fonts seem to really slow down the bevel tool. The font I used has many nodes if converted to editable shapes. When I beveled the font the redraw crawled slower than Big Frank's tortoise! It took much will power to keep from ctrl-alt-deleting it out of existance. If you try it have patience.

Regards, Ross

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

[Soquili]

Gary - Very enlightening. Now I won't waste so much time with trial and error. Well, at least not much on trial; my error factor seems to be consistant [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

Ross - I was very curious how you achieved the slate look. I remember using slate boards in grammer school.

Soquili [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img]

[james_frost]

Fantastic tutorial, Gary.

Keep up the good work...

(btw, any news on the possibility of some XaraX sub forums - tips, bugs, whatever ?)

James

[Egg Bramhill]

Gary / Ross
Thanks for the tut's. Of course the techniques can be used for more than just stone engraving.
I've created a coin with your techniques (I'll probably end up in the tower now!) I really need to work on the metal effect more but I was more interested in the engraving.
Egg

[This message was edited by Egg Bramhill on April 18, 2001 at 05:56 AM.]

[Egg Bramhill]

.

[gwpriester]

I always like to "repurpose" images where ever possible. I used the techniques gained from the stone carving excercises to create an anniversary card for my brother and his wife.

Of interest in this "mini-tutorial" thread is for the raised text for HAPPY and ANNIVERSARY etc. I changed the bevel color to match one of the colors in the elliptical marble plaque using the eyedropper tool in the Color Editor.

Eric

Your image is incredibly photographic. Whomever suggested--I think it was Ross--that actual stone carvers use Xara to show how carved images might look was a brilliant marketing idea.

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

Be It Even So Humble...

[Big Frank]

Egg, that 20p is effing brilliant! Now let's see you do the other side!!! [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

One gripe (only because I feel a post here is wasted if I don't :b ): the 20p, as you mention, looks too grey (as if it's a monochrome image). I can't wait to see the nickel-alloy effect which I just know you'll show us next!

--
Big Frank was
http://www.wognum.org/files/madewithxarax.gif

[rubem]

Why not a "gel on stone"?

Rubem