Get help with creating your t-shirt graphics. Discuss t-shirt design software, special effect techniques, or other topics related to creating a t-shirt design on your computer.
Please I've wanted to learn how you guys do this for years and it just frustrates me, it seems there has to be an easy way to make them look this cool. You get a photo like this:
Most likely the photo was brought into a vector program such as Illustrator or CorelDRAW. The image is locked on a layer and a new layer is created for manually tracing the various elements/objects in the vehicle using the tools of the software. Pretty much how I do it. You can draw the image by hand, scan and trace to vector. This takes a lot of practice as getting a good scan and trace without the need for hours of cleaning up the image.
Just for an idea, this design took me about 6 hours to render from a customer supplied photo of the car. All vector all CorelDRAW.
i myself want to learn as well i know that ive seen shops that have some electronic tablet and pen that is connected to the pc which aids them in tracing such art but im not sure if it is a neccesity.....
I use a tablet at work and home on my laptop. They are not necessary and I actually had my tablet for about a year before I really learned to use it. They are great yet not necessary. learning the software is your best bet before trying to learn a new tool.
I still learn something new every day with my software. You just have to spend tons of hours messing and designing. Make sure you read your user guides/manuals. I know they are boring yet they tell you how do use the tools.
There are tons of after market books, tutorials and courses you can take on the software you use. Trying to do as much of these as possible will ultimately broaden your knowledge of the software.
the wacoms are wonderful toys and i'm saving my pennies but in the meantime..........take a transparency sheet (like you use for overhead projectors) and put it over the photo and with an india ink pen - or an ultrafine sharpie if all else fails! - trace the details you want to keep and ignore those you don't. YES it takes a lot of practice, but you'll get better! scan in your results at a good dpi (300 minimum) oh! put a piece of clean white paper behind it so you don't get 'scan trash' from the cover! you can scan it straight into corel draw and then the real fun begins play with the various trace functions and see if you come up with something cleanable- frankly i usually just switch to wireframe view and draw my vector image right on top of the scan - takes a lot less time and cleaning as a rule!
sorry to say, there isn't a magic button (yet!) to take the scut work out of our business!
I got the Wacom Cintiq 21ux a couple weeks ago. I haven't freehanded something for a long time so it is slowly coming back to me. If you have the money for it, it is definately worth every penny!
Wow Cintiq 21ux, I really got to get myself one of those!
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By manual tracing, do you mean scan or lock an image and tracing something? Or are you talking about Livetrace for Illustrator CS2? Live trace isn't much use (as for me at least), the quality suffers a lot. The tablets are junk for vector art in my opinion (not sure if its easier in Coreldraw, never used it). I do like them for sketching on my pc under Sketchbook Pro though. However, if you are in the market for a new laptop, and would like to use a tablet, check out the tablet pc's. It's much easier to work with.
Basically to answer your first question, it takes time and practice. Than it gets a bit easier, but it still takes TIME. Good luck and keep practicing.
hey eveyone, I have came across great info about doing this. But i do have some questions. I want to take photos and do cool effects to them and/or create a masterpiece for a t-shirt using the photo as a base. Now from what I have read I can use photo shop and/or illstrutor or coraldraw, right? Also I have looked into the prices of those softwares which are up there no problem. Just that I am just starting out (funds have not came in yet) and I saw one of the threads that talks about using free software that you can download off the internet. With the free stuff can you do the photo to masterpiece thing or will i have to upgrade and pay money for the other software? Also with the free software are those vector programs? Thanks for all help.
I got the Wacom Cintiq 21ux a couple weeks ago. I haven't freehanded something for a long time so it is slowly coming back to me. If you have the money for it, it is definately worth every penny!
congratz on the purchase!! I'm saving for one now. Shooting for the 20 wsx here. Also had my eyes on the 12" one that recently came out, at half the price (1K) it looked attractive, but I'm just going to hold my horses and wait till I have the money to get the one I want.
I basically use AI and a tablet. I put the photo in the lowest layer and trace with the pen tool on layers above that. This way, I can keep everything separate and tweak it as needed. Working with the pen tool and tablets just takes practice and is well worth it...
Photo to Vector Help 
but in the meantime..........take a transparency sheet (like you use for overhead projectors) and put it over the photo and with an india ink pen - or an ultrafine sharpie if all else fails! - trace the details you want to keep and ignore those you don't. YES it takes a lot of practice, but you'll get better! scan in your results at a good dpi (300 minimum) oh! put a piece of clean white paper behind it so you don't get 'scan trash' from the cover! you can scan it straight into corel draw and then the real fun begins 
play with the various trace functions and see if you come up with something cleanable- frankly i usually just switch to wireframe view and draw my vector image right on top of the scan - takes a lot less time and cleaning as a rule!
Good luck and keep practicing.
Re: Photo to Vector Help 
congratz on the purchase!! I'm saving for one now. Shooting for the 20 wsx here. Also had my eyes on the 12" one that recently came out, at half the price (1K) it looked attractive, but I'm just going to hold my horses and wait till I have the money to get the one I want.
