How do I import image, create silhouette, create a smooth vector outline of silhouette

[Chiefmonkey]

Hello folks,

I'm trying to convert from photoshop to affinity but am struggling.  This literally takes me seconds in AI.

I find a picture I like... I open it up... I trace the image as silhouette... I expand the image... I have outline of image... a smooth outline no anti-aliasing.

How do I do this in Affinity?  It's been 2 hours of googling and playing but no luck...  So far this is what I've done:

Opened up image in Photo... removed background... save as .png... open up image in Designer... layer effects > Outline... I expand the outline (but I can not tell what thats done, if anything)

I'm now stuck... how do I just get that outline... nothing else, just a vector image of that outline with no anti-aliasing?

Thank you for any helpful answers

(I'm begging you guys for help here, I seriously do not want to go back to Adobe... I realise there's a learning curve and there will be something obvious but I'm struggling... I can usually switch to a new bit of software with a few tutorials and some googling but this is just getting painful... sorry)

[GarryP]

The short answer is that you can’t create a vector drawing from a raster image without creating the vectors manually.
None of the Affinity products have a facility to convert raster to vector, yet.
It’s been asked for many times, and will probably come at some point in the future, but when that will be is anyone’s guess.

P.S. The Outline Effect that you used will only give a raster outline of the image. It finds the edge of the image and puts some pixels around it, it’s not what could be deemed by some as a ‘real’ outline.

Edited November 12, 2019 by GarryP
Added P.S.

[Chiefmonkey]

Oh god that was the answer I was dreading

I still want to support the underdog though... I've bought copies and will continue to play with them but it looks like I'm going to have to pay the extortionate Adobe fee's 

Thank you for your reply Gary... just to double check... are you saying I can not convert that pink outline I've created into a vector?

[lacerto]

(...)

[Chiefmonkey]

Hey Lagarto,

Really appreciate your solution... just loaded it up and it is perfect... unfortunately Inkscape, as much as I love to use open source and (donate to it) is clunky AF with it's XQuartz on my mac...  so frustrating... I love the Affinity software, it really does have a beautifully made UI... it just doesn't do what I need

Looks like I'm going to have to suck up the Adobe price in order to have that "just works" experience... I do appreciate all the answers and help I've had from folks here but I also have animation to do 

Looks like my move to open source and alternatives to the giants will have to wait a little longer... gutted but I gotta work, eat and pay bills

Thanks again 

[PixelPest]

Inkscape1.0 beta is a native app - no XQuartz necessary. I´m used to use a native macOS version since 2015. As much hope I had for Affinity Designer I can´t live without Inkscape.

[GarryP]

Chiefmonkey, if it’s only conversion to vectors that is holding you back then there are lots of online converters to choose from. I haven’t used any myself and I am wary of using this sort of online give-us-your-stuff-for-free thing but they may be useful.
Super Vectorizer 2 for Mac http://www.svgvector.com/vectorize-image-mac.html looks impressive (again not used it myself) and is only $30 a year (free trial available).
Or maybe you could find an old copy of Serif DrawPlus or CorelDRAW for sale somewhere.

[v_kyr]

Vectorization and autotracing software for Macs:

• Super Vectorizer 2 (commercial)
• Intaglio Vectorize (free to use)
• DragPotrace + Potrace (free)
• AutoTrace (free)
• Inkscape (free)

Further there are a bunch of online tracing services which mostly use Potrace or AutoTrace as their tracing base here.

• kingfisher.svg

 

[PixelPest]

21 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

Vectorization and autotracing software for Macs:

• Intaglio Vectorize (free to use)

Have you tried that?

[v_kyr]

5 minutes ago, PixelPest said:

Have you tried that?

AFAI remember I tried that out once, it works with setup layers (manual layer based) and offers manual adjustments. So you do sort of a manual color quantization with that software (setup each wanted color layer). It can give good results though needs more time and manual work in contrast to other software.

However, personally I mostly use my own Potrace based software tool for bitmap tracing, which also can reroute the traced result directly into Designer (so to say the lazy way).

 

[PixelPest]

Was just asking because it just traces one color/value at the time.

[v_kyr]

Yes as default Intaglio Vectorize traces one color layer, so you would have to setup/add other additional color layers manually inside, in oder to trace for multiple colors. I'm not sure if that software uses maybe potrace too internally, since potrace usually traces just in BW and thus in order to trace for multiple colors one needs a color quantisation method there for dealing with the handling of different colors.

Inkscape for example does exactly that automatically, they use a modified potrace code here, where they do their own color quantisation with. - Aka remember and extract all colors, or a setup amount of the most used colors, then do a continious sequence vector trace after all those single colors, finally add all traced color vector layers together to form the colored vector result.

See also related:

• Inkscape tracing bitmaps
• How do I replicate Inkscape's bitmap tracer?
• From the Potrace FAQ ...

  Quote

  Question: How can I work around the lack of color support?

  Answer: There are many ways in which Potrace can be useful in processing color images, with some extra work. For example, you can trace an image to SVG format using the --svg and --opaque options, and then use e.g. Inkscape to color it manually.

  Or you can extract individual color components from your image using the Gimp or ppmcolormask (part of the netpbm package), trace them separately, and then overlay the pieces to get a multicolored image. You can get pretty good results for posterized images. I have used a command line similar to this:

  
  cat img.gif | giftopnm | ppmcolormask #641b1b | potrace
  

  Recent versions of Inkscape have a built-in Potrace engine that can handle color images via color quantization or multiple scanning, thanks to the great work of Bob Jamison and the Inkscape team.

  Another interesting application of Potrace to color images is described in the fascinating article Automatic Generation of Stained Glass from Scanned Photos by C. Scott Ananian.

  Question: Does Potrace provide centerline tracing? Instead of tracing the contour of my image, I just want a single line in the center of each stroke.

  Answer: No, Potrace is not designed to do centerline tracing, and for technical reasons, it is unlikely that this will change in the near future. Algorithms used for centerline tracing are quite different than those used for outline tracing; it might be more useful to write a separate program for this purpose. You could try Autotrace, which has such a feature.

   

[PixelPest]

Actually the user defines quantisation and other parameters:

[v_kyr]

3 minutes ago, PixelPest said:

Actually the user defines quantisation and other parameters:

Yes, in Inkscape you can limit or enhance color scans, setup quantisation, generally adjust settings to use etc.  In Intaglio Vectorize for color traces you have to do add/setup manually more color layers for the desired colors there then.

[PixelPest]

Just one last from me on this topic as I literally live in Inkscape and Intaglio; Inkscape1.0 will get an additional centerline tracer.

[v_kyr]

3 minutes ago, PixelPest said:

Just one last from me on this topic as I literally live in Inkscape and Intaglio; Inkscape1.0 will get an additional centerline tracer.

Honestly I don't know, since I didn't followed their latest software version evolution approaches. But if they also add centerline tracing capabilities that's good news and of course will offer some more tracing capabilities then. All in all Inkscape has very smart tracing capabilities. - Further if they now support MacOS Quartz directly, so no more XQuartz is needed, it will be even better to use on Macs too.

A quite good one for Macs, easy to use with quick/fast turnarounds (but commercial) is that Super Vectorizer software, which too offers vectorizing of images by edge, centerline, color or grey color.

 

 

[PixelPest]

I got SV2 for 99ct at an offer, but still prefer Inkscape over it. You can get it for 20 bucks at StackSocial I believe. I´m not advertising here!

Regarding XQuartz/Inkscape: see my note 3hs ago. 

[v_kyr]

46 minutes ago, PixelPest said:

I got SV2 for 99ct at an offer, but still prefer Inkscape over it.

Well it's a no brainer for that price, I've once (long ago) got an older SV version for that low price.

I've tried the native Inkscape1.0 beta app and it works Ok so far also under El Capitan, so I've exchanged the XQuartz one with that. - Well X11 times are gone by far, last time I worked/programmed with the X Window System was under NeXTstep via Cub'X-Window, then porting some XView (OpenLook) stuff for NeXT (so ages ago).