Line drawings

[schaf]

Can anyone recommend a good free download program which will convert photo's to line drawings.
I have the idea that it may help when laying out the start of a carving.
I hope someone can help.

Regards Terry

[Robson Valley]

Terry, I've seen some results and none of them are really very good.

Here's what I do: I use Google Images to find pictures. Sometimes, I get lucky and line drawings turn up. Google "green sea turtle" to see what I mean.

When I click on a thumbnail, the link takes me to the website of origin. On the the right side of my computer screen I see "full size image". If I click on that, sometimes I get a bigger image, sometimes not.
Save the image
Edit the image.
Artificially dictate the pixel size you want.
Print that.
Stick it on a window and trace on a clean sheet of paper. In the tracing, I can alter body proportions to fit the wood I have on hand.

[schaf]

Thanks RV, I already follow all the steps you outlined except the last one.
Never thought to place light behind the photo to trace it. Thats one to fall back on if I cannot find a program.

Terry

[Robson Valley]

Ha! Us great minds think alike. I got a pretty fuzzy picture (painting actually) of a Pacific Halibut fish. Simple oval outline. Was just as easy to scale it up and draw the thing freehand on big paper. I don't know what size you call it but 11" x 17" is my favorite.
I draw center lines on 50 sheets at a time and start almost all of my carvings on that paper.

If what you're looking for is some particular fish, the International Game Fish Association
( IGFA ) World Records website index is open to the public. Good pictures.

Until some rotten political sod figures out a way to tax daylight, I'll use the window as my solar-powered tracing machine. Hard, smooth surface, evenly lit, quite a bit cheaper than my Canon 8800 scanner was.

[Whittling]

I would agree with everything RV has suggested and add that if your photo is a but fuzzy or unclear, do an outline right on the photo in a heavy black texta. This is much easier to see when you do your tracing steps.

The other thing I might mention is try using Microsoft Publisher to manipulate your photos first... to get them to the right size, proportion or angle before you print and trace. The program has the ability to manipulate size an position easily and has a built in scale and reference lines that can be added to ensure sizing or position. A lot of the work can be done electronically before you ever commit to ink.

[schaf]

Thanks Whittling, I will have a look at microsoft publisherand see if I can work it out.

[Woodwould]

If in colour, I would first convert the image to greyscale and then possibly increase the contrast. Using a light box makes tracing the image much simpler. If you don't feel like buying one, you could knock one up yourself...

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCRzCrsnLnw"]How to Make a Cheap Lightbox - YouTube[/ame]

[petersemple]

I have seen tutorials on how to do this on the net for producing scroll saw patterns from photos. I would google scroll saw from photos and see what you can find. I think a lot of them use photoshop, but you should be able to do most of it using GIMP as most of the features are similar.

[Robson Valley]

Be careful. Don't confuse technology with civilization. There is no reason, what so ever, to believe that you are restricted to what the computer can (or can't) do. For that reason alone, I despise computer technology.

[petersemple]

Sure, but the OP specifically talked about downloading programs, which implies using a computer

[schaf]

Thanks guys for your imput. I think that if you have a computer I may as well use the technology. The couple of free downloads I have looked at are no better then tracing off the photo. I was looking for very clear detail where I could take measurements between certain points.
Thank you all
Terry

[Robson Valley]

I've just posted some illustrations for my Halibut Serving Platter. I believed that I had to scale up a fuzzy picture and alter/compress some features of fish anatomy to fit the available wood. You can see how it happened. I'd like to use technology to do that for me
but I'd expect a 24" printer. I really enjoyed using my judgement in the design process.
Maybe it flopped but I've had a good time stumbling.

[Gunnaduit]

I haven't seen free trace software, but it might be out there. Keywords: bitmap tracing, raster to vector.

The low-cost commercial version is CorelTrace, part of CorelDraw graphics suite.

EBay often has older versions of CorelDraw on sale. Older versions are fine, I run CorelDraw 11 on Windows 7.

But be warned - it isn't magic, and the hassle of getting it good might not be worth it. I generally trace by hand or by polyline tracing over the bitmap in something like CorelDraw or one of the cad programs.

Edit P.S. and I am generally a cad/illustration software addict, so if I'm tracing by hand, that means it really might be the best option.

[dabbler]

I'm pretty sure you want the "outline" function or filter. Try it in combination with "emboss" and/or a converion to gray-scale.

The terms "function", "filter", "treatment" all mean pretty much the same thing at this level. They're just ways to say "a way to change an image".

The expression "line drawing" tends to be at odds with pixel oriented photographic images and more often used in cad/cam and vector graphics, so consider that when searching for software.

However, even the most basic photo editors and paint programs usually offer these basic functions as well as crop/resize/aspect ratio control, so check your computer to see what you have already installed. The higher performing software packages can be frustrating to learn if you're just dipping your toe in the water (so to speak).

There are free-ish online services too.

If you have any software for digital camera, it more than likely has these basic functions too. In fact if you've installed some it might be masking the image editing software your computer's operating system had pre-installed. The same thing can happen if you install another photo editor.

[schaf]

Thanks Gunnaduit and Dabbler, I thought this would be easy and now i'm starting to get lost.
I have taken the step and enrolled in a digital photo processing class at the local community U3A. I think that they use photoshop.
Tracing from a photo may still turn out to be the best option.
Thanks
Terry