Redrawing image, tips or tutorials?

[TMP_D]

Hello,

Could someone point me in a direction to finding a tutorial, or getting some tips on redrawing (manual) to vector, Ive been with corel draw since it was corel 3, but I also try some with Illustrator, ive never really had to redraw anything complicated but I feel that I may have to in the near future, and would like to start getting better at more complicated images before I have a deadline attached to it, I would be grateful for any suggestions

[ROADSIDE]

Hours and Hours and Hours of practice.

There are 6 million ways to solve every problem so its really about being comfortable with what you are trying to accomplish.

Post an image you are having problems with and I will see what I can do for you in the way of a tutorial

[TMP_D]

Ok, here is something I’ve been toying with, just to try and figure out some techniques to get it to vector

[ROADSIDE]

ahh... see I would just print that as a photo half tone.
Have you tried the live trace feature in Illustrator CS3?
That would be the easiest way to start.

[TMP_D]

Sorry Chief, didn’t see your reply to this

So what kind of rez do you look at when putting the image straight to shirt, or screen?

Guess I just had an outlined, simple looking image in mind from start?

Thx

[TMP_D]

I only have CS2 and am very limited in Illustrator abilities at this time, I was raised a Corel user

I have tried the trace on Corel though, can get it to look the same for the most part, but in 30k + pieces

[ROADSIDE]

it really depends on the customer.
If they want a tight halftone I would run them at 85lpi on a 305mesh screen.
If they werent so picky I would use 33lpi and 110 mesh. At 2-3 feet away (average space between to people talking) the image will look great.

If I were to illustrate it I would prolly do it the way you are heading.
Outline the entire image.
Then add all the details. Maybe toss in some gradient mesh to get some depth to the illustration.

Funny because while I was writing this I had to do a dog image for the local K-9 unit.

Monroe-Twp-PoliceF.jpg (15.52 KiB) Viewed 380 times

[TMP_D]

Cool, thanks chief

Ya maybe I picked the wrong image to start toying with, I have a guy that breeds hunting dogs wanting some shirts made up and thought I’d give it a try, but if you have a decent image to work with, like you have on the K-9 design, I can see that being the way to go

Thanks again

[ROADSIDE]

Yes the image is KEY.
I took mine into photoshop and did away with the background then brought it into illustrator to add the text.

Printing of white tees.... I just out put the film then print.
Printing of black tees.... I would invert the color of the dog image before out putting.

[Jeremy]

When redrawing other people's artwork, you need to try to "get into" their mind. Keep in mind they probably used similar software to what you are using, so think about how you would build it, what tools you would use, etc. Roadside is very correct though, it really takes a lot of practice.

One tip I always try to remember when trying to recreate lines from a very pixelized source image is to LOOK at the anti-aliasing. The darker that pixel is, the more of that line you are redrawing touched that particular pixel. Lighter pixels probably barely touch the actual line. Look here for an example I made. The red line (my trace line) has reduced opacity so you can see the source raster "line" behind it.

http://www.phrenicdesign.com/repos/antialiasingline.png