Extracing portions of an image

[Gamerprinter]

I apologize if what I am showing you is more complex than you need, I'm just basically taking apart something I did in Xara Designer Pro 9 recently for one of my own projects.

I needed a realistic looking spider as a map object for a fantasy map I was creating. So I first modeled a spider in 3D, rendered it in light gray color and placing it on a white ground plain so it would cast a realistic shadow - this is my starting image, instead of just a photo (its a photo image rendered from a 3D program).



Next I imported the image to Xara Designer Pro 9 - the graphic showing the 12 steps is as follows:

1. First image is the photo image imported to Xara.
2. Next I created an outline shape using the Freehand Drawing Tool and traced the outer edge of all five spiders as shown
3. Next I select all the drawn shapes and original photo and apply Arrange/Combine/Intersect. I end up with clipped spiders.
4. Next I draw the shadows of the spider image, as a separate object (this way I can apply transparency to shadow not spiders)
5. This step I place the shadows beneath the clipped photo of the spider - it looks just like the original, but there is not background now.
6. Looking at just one spider zoomed in.
7. I want to create more realistic beady spider eyes, so I create black circles, place feathered edge white highlights and drop shadows.
8. I rescale the beady eyes to fit and appropriately place on the spiders head.
9. Now I copy the clipped spider image, then I draw a shape selecting the middle areas of each leg and part of its mandibles, then apply Arrange/Combine/Slice onto the copy..
10. Now selecting that orange color I apply the color onto the sliced part of the leg, then apply Stain-Glass Transparency so you can see through the color at the shaded leg image beneath it.
11. Without showing all the steps I select more areas of the spider, applying different colors (brown and dark gray) and end up with this.
12. Finally, because the shadow and spider are separate objects, I can place the final spider onto a floor surface and the shadow realistically shows the floor beneath.

Final Image zoomed in.



This is what you can do with clipping photos with shapes. I never vectorize a photo image, I always keep it in JPG or whatever bitmap format it already is. I work in vector shapes whether circles, rectangles or hand-traced shapes using the Freehand tool and keep the photos intact as photos. You don't need to vectorize an image, you can still do a lot with Xara and clipping actual photos.

So drawing a circle around the edge of your baseball then applying Arrange/Combine/Intersect and you'll get what you want.

Did that help - or was this tutorial too much for you? I know its more than you asked, but I thought I'd show you the power of using Xara and clipping photos in complex ways to accomplish what you might need for your projects...