cut lines for .jpegs

[megacab]

I have a group of .jpegs or .bmps that i am going to have printed onto coro. in order to have them contour cut, i need to provide vector cut lines. i am totally stumped on how to do this. probably something basic, i just have never had to do this before. thanks for any and all help.

 

[megacab]

You'll have to use the bezier/freehand tool if you need to draw them out. Another way is to trace bitmap then clean up the points leaving you with a vector cut line....however I usually just create by hand.

Hope that makes sense?

ya. it makes sense. i thought i would have to use the bezier, but was unsure if that was the way or not. thanks.

 

[OADesign]

What tools to you have at hand? Photoshop? Flexi? Illustrator? What do the images look like? Full on color pictures or basic shapes and or text?

 

[megacab]

i have corel x4. i have been trying to find time to redraw with the bezier tool but the truth of the matter is i haven't had time and i'm just not that good with it. they are just a basic shape that i need to trace to provide a vector cut line for. i was looking for an easier way than redrawing, but doesn't seem like i can accomplish it the easy way. although, by now in this game, i should know how to use the bezier easily. i'm almost ashamed to admit that i suck at it.

 

[2972renfro]

maybe convert to black/white image and adjust levels to make all black and then autotrace. Or farm it out

 

[cdiesel]

Lol.. I didn't know you sucked at it :Big Laugh

I'll have my guys take care of it.. It's simple enough though. In Corel, just use autotrace and then clean up the resulting vector.

 

[megacab]

thanks buddy. I appreciate it. i will email you all the files tomorrow.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Hey don't be ashamed....! It's not something that is easily learned. I'm not all that proficient with it either in Corel. I personally prefer Composer for creating cut shapes....but I'm slowly getting the hang of Corel.

Practice makes perfect! (or so they say lol)

I'm not all that good in Corel. I find Ai much more intuitive for me. Unfortunately, too many of my specific software uses Draw as a "backbone", so I need to know this stuff. It would help with workflow instead of going from Ai to another program and then output.

 

[markymarkmfb]

Megacab, If Chris can't do it for you for whatever reason, I can do it for you. It's a 2 minute job with Flexi. Let me know if I can help.

 

[megacab]

wow! just wanna say thanks to everyone for the offers to help and the input on how to do it.:U Rock: this just makes me realize how much i still don't know. only been doing this for 2 years, so still a long, long way to go. as long as i don't lose sight of that, I'll be alright.

 

[royster13]

I have been using some of my software for over 15 years (Illustrator since 6.0 in 1996) and almost everyday I realize how little I know....I learned something with the "Group Selection Tool" the other days than would have saved me many of hours of grief over many years had I learned it earlier.....

 

[natedawg9640]

in PS, if the image is high res enough to get a fairly smooth selection, just select the area to be contoured, go to "paths" pallete, and click/hold the little arrow in the upper right and select "make new work path". then you can go to file export "paths to illustrator" and it will export that vector path as an .EPS file that you can import into whatever software. depending on the artwork, it can save you the steps it takes to run it through B/W vectorizing software.

 

[Bobby H]

If I have to manually create a "clipping path" or cut path around a photographic object I'll often create the path in Photoshop.

I prefer the keyboard short cuts with Photoshop's pen tool. Illustrator's short cuts are slightly similar, but different enough to cause problems.

With Photoshop, you can use combinations of the Ctrl, Alt, Shift and Space bar keys to adjust vector paths while you are creating them AND be able to zoom in/out of the artwork or hand pan across it all while you digitize the paths. I can execute those keyboard short cuts with my left hand while using the mouse with my right hand. None of the dedicated vector drawing programs do this. Not Illustrator. Not CorelDRAW. Freehand didn't do it either. Deneba Canvas and Micrographx Designer didn't support those sorts of short cuts. Only Photoshop. You can create a very accurate clipping path or cut path pretty fast.

Photoshop even allows you to do some basic welding and cutting operations on paths too. Finally, the vector paths in Photoshop are placed in pixel-specific areas. There's no slight, visual shifting of the path taking place like what can happen with paths traced over placed photos in CorelDRAW or Illustrator.

 

[The Vector Doctor]

If I have to manually create a "clipping path" or cut path around a photographic object I'll often create the path in Photoshop.

I prefer the keyboard short cuts with Photoshop's pen tool. Illustrator's short cuts are slightly similar, but different enough to cause problems.

With Photoshop, you can use combinations of the Ctrl, Alt, Shift and Space bar keys to adjust vector paths while you are creating them AND be able to zoom in/out of the artwork or hand pan across it all while you digitize the paths. I can execute those keyboard short cuts with my left hand while using the mouse with my right hand. None of the dedicated vector drawing programs do this. Not Illustrator. Not CorelDRAW. Freehand didn't do it either. Deneba Canvas and Micrographx Designer didn't support those sorts of short cuts. Only Photoshop. You can create a very accurate clipping path or cut path pretty fast.

Photoshop even allows you to do some basic welding and cutting operations on paths too. Finally, the vector paths in Photoshop are placed in pixel-specific areas. There's no slight, visual shifting of the path taking place like what can happen with paths traced over placed photos in CorelDRAW or Illustrator.

Hmmm i cannot get the spacebar to work like it does in illustrator. In AI if you change your mind about where you want the point to be positioned as you are tracing points you can use the spacebar to move it over a bit to fine tune. It does not work that way in PS. I usually do all of my path tracing in AI on contours in AI unless the customer specifically asks for a photoshop file with a clipping mask embedded in it

How are you getting the spacebar to work the same way?

I am also not seeing this shift that are talking about. I can trace exactly on the line as I can in photoshop, no variance

Second to last move in the attached movie shows the spacebar move in use

 

[TyrantDesigner]

i have corel x4. i have been trying to find time to redraw with the bezier tool but the truth of the matter is i haven't had time and i'm just not that good with it. they are just a basic shape that i need to trace to provide a vector cut line for. i was looking for an easier way than redrawing, but doesn't seem like i can accomplish it the easy way. although, by now in this game, i should know how to use the bezier easily. i'm almost ashamed to admit that i suck at it.

in corel, just throw the image into draw, pen tool it out when you get the image to size ... done.