Vinyl cut outs and tracing images

[Freshkicks]

Hello there it's me again :P

So i left the old HP plotter for what it is and bought myself 1 off the chinese branded plotters the P cut 630.

Haven't had much problems till now but it seems to be working great and that only for 400 dollars is not a bad deal.

So i had some high quality images i want to trace in Corelldraw ( i'm not too familiar with this program i always work in Photoshop. )

So the first thing i do is pre edit the pictures in photoshop export them in EPS and then import them in Corell.

This might seem a bit of work but hey i'm a total noob in Corell.
When i trace out the outlines off my designs they sometimes come out ribbley not completely straight and clean.

I tried to soften and smoothen the edges and still not perfect as i want it.

Any help or tips ?

I also want to make a 2 or 3 different collor design on vinyl.
I saw a while ago a movie on youtube about it but i can't find it again i realy like to make like 2 or 3 different collor design.
But i don't know how exactly.

I juse corel x4 and Artcut x 2 for the cutting


Best regards

Michael

[debogus]

Michael
Are you drawing in vector format ?
At first read IT looked like to me ,that you created your art in photo shop then exported in eps then traced in corel ? So its a picture not a vector.

Tracing always adds jags.

You'll just have to learn to edit the vector tracing
My plotter came with Flexisign and it has tools for straighting a line between 2 points or a curve with 3 points that I mostly use.

Or just import the picture and draw a new one on another layer.( some times quicker)

I would think that corel has the same type of thing.

multi colors on mine ,you just draw it in different colors , when you send it to the plotter ,you tell it to cut only one color, run it , change vinyl select next color and so on .

What kind of software did the plotter/cutter come with ?
Mostly its play until you figure it out.

There are people here that have more knowlege than me , perhaps they will chime in.

Dave

[Freshkicks]

Hey Dave,

Thanks for your reply
I don't know if i am drawing in vector format :P

My plotter comes with Signcut X2 and i am not completely familiar with the program haven't tried a lot off options yet.

I still need to be playing a lot i'm also gonna cut and make my own shirts because i allready have a heat press.

This will be very exciting i think

[debogus]

Not familiar with signcut ,I took a quick look at their site ,didn't notice anything about node editing .

I did see that it has plug ins for corel and inkscape .
Appears to be more of a mach 3 type of program where you design somewhere else then boot to it.

Illustrator was also supported ,these are all graphic type programs and will generate vector formats.

Well it looks like you get to learn sign cut and corel

No problem
Start small and simple and play
Especially little things like the speed settings

Have fun

Dave

[jemmyell]

Hi,

The best results with CorelDRAW will be achieved by using the bitmap as the 'idea' for the drawing and just tracing on top of it. To do this import your bitmap onto layer 1, then lock it for editing. Create a layer 2 and do your actual drawing there. Here is a tutorial that shows how a logo can be recreated like this. The result is EXTRA high quality and can pretty much be scaled to any size.

http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/cor...ltracelogo.htm

[bisjoe]

Photoshop won't draw in vector format, you need to use Corel or Adobe Illustrator which are vector based programs.

Whatever program you use initially, the best file type to import is tif. Then run corel trace on that. You will have to learn to adjust the settings to get the best possible output from Trace, it takes time, as does "cleaning up" in Draw by manipulating the points, lines, and curves. In many cases, with fairly simple shapes, it's easier to import the file then use the box and circle tools and smartdraw tool in corel to recreate the image rather than use trace. Some people are fast at using smartdraw to trace an image with the mouse and get
better results that with corel Trace.

[skip20]

Buy CoCut for CorelDraw.
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