January 2015 Video Tutorial -- Tracing Is Not Cheating!

[Gare]

Okay, here comes #3.

I think this should be a lot easier; there's really no need for a gradient in any area, I don't believe.

And I even put a blank label on the bottle so you can create your own toilet water. How good does that get?!


-g

[Crow Haven]

Many thanks, Egg, Hajeem, and Gare for the kind words about my image.
I always see more things to adjust the next day...and after working at night at the computer things show much better in the daylight...so I fixed part of the wire rack, adjusted line tones, the shape of the shadow under the rack and enhanced its greenish hue more. Little things, and it'll never be perfect, whatever that is, but I'm satisfied with it for now.

I could never be any kind of teacher for Xara, I've been mostly self-taught from early on experimenting with what Xara can do, but have been continually learning from Gare's great tutorials and advice, which I can never thank him enough for (oh, and for his patience too).

[csehz]

So here's my attempt at your sharp focus coloured jar. It took probably 20 hours but I'm pleased with the result.

Well 20 hours is a lot but it was really worth it, as the result looks so real. Also interesting to see in the .xar file how you use layers plus the extra power of the named colors.

Maya yours one is the same great, this month the level I am afraid is too high for me Simply would not be able to distinguish a photo object in such a details, but it is a pleasure itself to see your drawings in the result of the challenge.

Like a good chess match between grandmasters

[Egg Bramhill]

Hi Gary, seems to have sorted itself out now. Previously it wasn't showing as an attachment but inline with the rest of your text. :/

Eric, rather than using the Slice
command, try intersect if the goal
‘is to make a leaf.
...and yes, the Slice command
produced a screwed-up result.
Perhaps the code doesn’t work
properly on the tangents of
shapes.

No I'm not trying to create a leaf, the object of the xar was to show that the Combine shapes can & does create rougue nodes and sometimes unwanted spaces. I was just supplying it as an example.

I've got an example on page two that shows it you want an array of a specific value of squares, like a chess board, if your source square has an outline, you'll get a different value thean if you create the array with a copy function.

Sorry, just can't agee with that. If you slice a shape with a line, the line width is of no importance. It slices exactly the same if the line has a 64px line width or a line width of 0px .

If the remaining sliced object has a line width it may APPEAR to have different value regarding size but this is just down to the state of the "Scale Line Width" icon, not the slicing operation. In your supplied example both left and right examples have squares of 53.1px. The only reason Xara is reporting the left side squares as 57.1px is you have "Scale Line Width" activated, so 53.1px plus a 4px line width = a reported 57.1 px square (strokes being half in & half out of the shape) . Toggle it off and Xara states the size of the square as 53.1px.

[Egg Bramhill]

Finally added a label, shadow and a bit more highlights. I don't want to do another glass jar for at least 10 years

[Crow Haven]

Cshez -- Thanks so much! There's always knowledge gained in working through these tutes.

Egg -- Looks great on the table!

For any interested in the wireframe of mine here it is...

[Egg Bramhill]

Cheers Maya Have you tried placing your jars on a background image so the background is part visible through the glass?

[Crow Haven]

Hi Egg, I hadn't originally thought to use the jar that way, but I tried it out with some fills for a quick background -- and it works pretty well.

[Egg Bramhill]

YES! Xara is great. That really works Maya.

[Crow Haven]

I was surprised, and thanks, Egg! It's great to find multiple uses for this jar. It would be easy to make the jar more transparent with adjusting a few shapes here and there too.