Christomanisto Posted February 4, 2021 Share Posted February 4, 2021 At the moment I'm using the pen tool - Zooming in really close and outlining each line. It's very time consuming. Is there a faster way to do this? Attached is an example of the kind of drawing I'd like to convert. I'd like to be able to have a flat image and play with the color (Where the drawing is black) Thanks! Priest cackle.pdf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fixx Posted February 4, 2021 Share Posted February 4, 2021 Vectorizing software can do it. Attached is a few examples, one done with Vectorize! and two with SuperVectorize 2 (one in skeleton mode i.e. lines are simple paths, not areas). Priest cackle_SV2skel.pdf Priest cackle_SV2norm.pdf Priesc_vec.pdf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 WOAH! That's awesome. Thanks so much for your fast response. I see that super vectorizer 2 is only available for Mac though, could you recommend a good alternative for windows? Fixx 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 I tried using Vector magic but I don't think it's what I'm looking for. And those images you posted above, are they editable in Affinity? Could I manipulate them/ change their color etc.? Thanks again! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
v_kyr Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 19 minutes ago, Christomanisto said: I tried using Vector magic but I don't think it's what I'm looking for. You can try out Inkscape's build-in vectorizer (freeware) which uses an enhanced Potrace/Autotrace version. 19 minutes ago, Christomanisto said: And those images you posted above, are they editable in Affinity? Could I manipulate them/ change their color etc.? Fixx posted for you vectorized images in PDF format, thus vector format. - Of course you can open these PDF files in Designer/Photo/Publisher and change every vector layer /curve) to your needs there. Fixx 1 Quote ☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan ☛ Affinity V2.3 apps ◆ MacOS Sonoma 14.2 ◆ iPad OS 17.2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 Okay brilliant, I'll check out Inkscape, thank you very much! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firstdefence Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Vector Magic (VM) can look more complicated than it actually is, it renders this drawing easily to SVG. A neat feature with VM is it will separate the colours in layers for you, so in the screenshot below I can turn off the white background so it's got transparency. Quote iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9 (Please refrain from licking the screen while using this forum) Affinity Help - Affinity Desktop Tutorials - Feedback - FAQ - most asked questions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 Really? How did you do that? Is that #ffffffff layer now an editable vector? And are you using the desktop version or online? Thanks for the response! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firstdefence Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 3 minutes ago, Christomanisto said: Really? How did you do that? Is that #ffffffff layer now an editable vector? And are you using the desktop version or online? Thanks for the response! edit away: Priest cackle.svg every part of the image is editable and basically in sections. Quote iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9 (Please refrain from licking the screen while using this forum) Affinity Help - Affinity Desktop Tutorials - Feedback - FAQ - most asked questions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 Okay, cheers for that. I tried the SVG but for some reason it wasn't editable. It just sharpened the image, all I could do was scale it. Are you using desktop VM? Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firstdefence Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Yes Desktop VM on Mac, Vector magic doesn't like to import PDF so I converted the PDF to a PNG file in Affinity Designer then opened the PNG file in Vector Magic, before exporting there are a few settings that need to be set in order to get the colour groups. Quote iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9 (Please refrain from licking the screen while using this forum) Affinity Help - Affinity Desktop Tutorials - Feedback - FAQ - most asked questions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 Ah right, I see! I've just got the online version so I don't think what you've done is possible for me. Thanks for taking the time though! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firstdefence Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Just now, Christomanisto said: Ah right, I see! I've just got the online version so I don't think what you've done is possible for me. Thanks for taking the time though! Vector Magic is worth buying if you are using it a lot and preferably it's earning it's keep by making money. Christomanisto 1 Quote iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9 (Please refrain from licking the screen while using this forum) Affinity Help - Affinity Desktop Tutorials - Feedback - FAQ - most asked questions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christomanisto Posted February 5, 2021 Author Share Posted February 5, 2021 Yeah it looks legit. The SVG you posted is pretty much the same thing. I'm just getting started so I think I'll try out inkscape for now, and get VM down the line at some point. Cheers for the advice. firstdefence 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
v_kyr Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Here is some short overview of some vectorizing/tracing forum threads and some of the available third party tools ... Quote ☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan ☛ Affinity V2.3 apps ◆ MacOS Sonoma 14.2 ◆ iPad OS 17.2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fixx Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 4 hours ago, Christomanisto said: Really? How did you do that? Is that #ffffffff layer now an editable vector? Of course if you vectorize art, background is selectable and can be made transparent. I have also used VM some and is very good. I just think there are cheaper alternatives also for PC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
v_kyr Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Yes VM is a good vectorizer though IMHO on the too expensive side here. Other vectorizing tools will give equally good results and are much cheaper or freeware in contrast to that one. After some research and comparisons I once did, the following desktop tools have shown to generate the best results in terms of vectorizing quality ... SuperVectorizer 2 (Mac, commercial) Inkscape's Potrace/Autotrace based build-in enhancements (Win/Mac/Linux, freeware) VectorMagic (Win/Mac, commercial) The above named tools do support color tracing with quite good/usable color quantisation, they also support outline- and center line tracing. In terms of workaround speed SV2 is the Speedy Gonzales among these here, meaning it's a very fast performer even on lame older hardware. Quote ☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan ☛ Affinity V2.3 apps ◆ MacOS Sonoma 14.2 ◆ iPad OS 17.2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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