| Often
it is difficult to get the exact images that you want from
standard clip-art and image files. A key skill is to be
able to convert a photograph into a graphic. For example
I've taken a quick photograph of my guitar:
It is difficult to select the outline with
the magic wand, thus it is a good idea to cut around the
guitar, and copy and paste it into another file:
Often it is possible to select the rest of
the outline with the magic wand, otherwise the outline is
deleted using a large air brush, followed by smaller air-brushes
around the edges of the guitar:
Some of the edges can be cleaned up by adding
straight lines, such as:
Next we can reduce the image, and put a drop
shadow on it. I've also added some text and a straight line,
so that it gives the user something to focus on:
or an alternative design could be:
I prefer the lower one, so let's try it with a great
hue:
or with a lesser hue:
Personally I prefer the blue version, as it seems to
fit better with the black lines. Next we can fill the
white space beside the text with a simple image, to give:
We can then reduce it down in size, to produce a final
graphic:
 |
 |
| 300-pixel
width |
200-pixel
width |
So let's try the 200-pixel graphic in a mock WWW page:
or if we use a 150-pixel image, and put it into the menu
option:
or using the large graphic across two columns:
All of these are reasonable, but I prefer the first one.
In summary you can see that images can be easily created
from photographs. The great thing about using photographs
is that you can set the object up in the required format,
without have to graphically manipulate it. It's amazing
how an ordinary photograph can be transformed into a professional-looking
graphic. In fact I can't believe that the guitar in the
graphic is my own guitar (although I don't really like
the look of blue guitars).
Path
clipping techniques
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