What do you guys use?

bskelhorn said:

Hi everyone,

I have been using photoshop and now starting to learn other means for design. But I would like to know what you guys use?

Pen / paper then scan it in? Just straight to photoshop with vectors etc?

I am trying to build a profie up of what people use so I can market my products accordingly.

Cheers

Click to expand...

There is no one cut and dried method or software it would depend on how the artwork comes to you, a lot of folks use a tablet to draw/trace directly into photoshop/illustrator/corel, although if presented with a drawing scanning the art is also another way of digitizing it.

The other thing is you have to keep in mind which printing process is going to be used, some processes require vector art (illustrator/corel) and some can use raster art (photoshop) but you can figure the bulk of the people here are designing in photoshop and if they need it to be a vector their importing it into illustrator or corel and converting it, or just creating it in illustrator or corel.

Hope this helps.

I draw most of my designs by hand, then ink them on vellum, then scan them in. At that point, I vectorize them with the Illustrator Live Trace option, and then take the art into CorelDraw to clean and color it.

Yea, it's just about experimenting and finding out what works for you.

bskelhorn said:

I am trying to build a profie up of what people use so I can market my products accordingly.

Click to expand...

Some people may disagree with me, but dont market something you're not confident/somewhat experienced doing just because someone else can or is doing it. Could put you in an awkward position.

bskelhorn said:

Hi everyone,

I have been using photoshop and now starting to learn other means for design. But I would like to know what you guys use?

Pen / paper then scan it in? Just straight to photoshop with vectors etc?

I am trying to build a profie up of what people use so I can market my products accordingly.

Cheers

Click to expand...

What are the other means that you have learned?

Thanks for the reply's. The other means are mainly illistrator using live trace. I have had mixed results but I am getting there.

For starters, I would advice concentrating more on learning a vector program. But it really depends on what most of your artwork looks like.

Are you an artist? Do you draw? If so, scan and trace may be your best friend(especially if your images are free hand images). If your images has lots of defined curves, aligned outlines, etc, you may also find that drawing the image in a vector program may be better.

If most of your images now are photographic in nature then PS is the way to go.

I use Corel Draw. If someone sends me a graphic in Photoshop I import to Corel and trace it in Corel to make it a vectored design.

I am a corel user too. But its a little funny that I find InkEscape a better tracing program, which I use to trace before cleaning up with corel. An intermediate step I seem unable to do without.