Tracing a simple template – Paint Bucket Mini Tutorial

Want a quick and easy way to autotrace a simple line art shape in Inkscape without the pesky double line problem? Well, once you have your defaults set, all it takes is one click with the paint bucket tool.

The steps above work for any fairly crisp line art you can open or import into Inkscape. Zoom in so that the shape you want to vectorize fits on the screen and is as large as possible without the “jaggies.” Clicking the plus and minus keys is helpful for finding the right zoom level. Then simply follow the steps on the screen shot above, which is from this file if you want to follow along. (Note: I set my paint bucket fill to none and its stroke to hot pink for high visibility, but remember, colors, line styles, etc. don’t matter to SCAL.)
Some other notes:

• If nothing happens when the paint bucket is clicked, try again and see if the infobar gives you an error message.
• If you do not see an outline appear, but a dotted rectangle appears around the shape, you need to set the stroke (outline color/thickness/transparency) so it is visible. This can be done with the Object>Fill and Stroke pallette.
• You can also switch to outline mode to see your new vector View>Display mode>Outline. The red X is your original image, which doesn’t display in outline mode since it is a bitmap.
• If your template’s shape is not completely closed like the one above, use the “Close Gaps” adjustment to the right of the other settings before you click with the paint bucket.
• If your template’s lines are not crisp like the one above or it has many levels of gray, turn the threshold level up and try again. If you do not like the result, just backspace, change the threshold setting and try again.
• When you are done tracing, you may want to press control-L one or more times to simplify the trace before you cut it. Set the simplification threshold in your Inkscape Preferences>Misc to .0005 for best results.
• If your template consists of multiple shapes, you can hold down the shift key as you click the paint bucket to automatically union each piece to the last.

Inkscape template for easy sizing

SCAL has a lot going for it, but one glaring flaw is how it handles the sizing of imported files. Basically you lose all your hard work at getting your Inkscape files at the right size and in proportion to one another when you go to import and have to find ways to correct for that once in SCAL. Hidden in these lengthy videos is a great tip for correcting this issue. I took the idea, refined it a little and made it into a 12 x 12 Inkscape template, which you can download here.

To use it, open the document in Inkscape (sorry, but it crashes Illustrator). Create your design to scale (leave a 1/4 inch margin to allow for the uncuttable area). You may add new layers but be sure to leave the original layer on at all times. Save as usual to Inkscape’s native svg format. Open a new document in SCAL. Set the default size to 12 inches (in the box on the Library Window). Placing the object at X:0, Y:0 is recommended but not required. Import your saved SVG.

The screen shots below show how using this template to create files for export to SCAL differs from a using a normal 12 x 12 document. When designing in Inkscape, both documents look like this:

In a normal document, the results of an import into SCAL…frustrating.

Using a true size template, the results are much more intuitive. Notice that it looks just like the outline in Inkscape.

Hope you enjoy using this template as much as I do. Thanks to Bob for the great idea.

Non-cutting annotation in Inkscape

One of the advantages of using .svg files, as opposed to .scut files, is that you don’t need the font loaded for the file to cut. But recently I opened an svg from a little while back and needed to change the wording. All of it had been converted to outlines for cutting and I had no idea what font I had used. If only I had noted that somewhere.

It dawned on me that I could put notes like that, and any other text I want, in the Inkscape file itself, and, as long as I don’t convert it to a path, it won’t affect the cutting. I could put it on a hidden layer, as well, but I’ll be much more likely to find the notes if they are right there, and so will anyone I share the file with. See the results of my annotation test below.

How the file looks in Inkscape (Outline View)

How the same file looks imported into SCAL

If you want to check if text is converted or not, double click on it. Regular text will have rotation arrows while text that has been converted into a path will show all its nodes. And just to be sure you don’t interfere with scaling, don’t select the annotations when transforming your design.

Stick Family Roundup

It seems that stick people are all the rage these days, at least for those of us on the minvan/SUV circuit. I have seen lots of questions about where to get stick people graphics to cut in vinyl on a Cricut, so I decided to do a little snooping about the stick family world.

You can always draw your own stick figures in Inkscape with the pen tool (use brush settings), but maybe you want to borrow some inspiration. I was amazed at the variety in styles I encountered online. Here are a few sites that are great for idea shopping:

• Upper Case Living My Family (heads only)
• The Personal Note
• Optimistic Stick People These are my favorite because they are very flattering to Mrs. Stick.

Samples from Letterrip.net

• Me & My Peeps™ Family Auto Decals

The next 3 sites have interactive stick family generators where you can play all day:

• Stick Figure Family Generator

Awesome sticker generator at Freeflashtoys.com

• Family Stickers Generator
• Family Stickerz Generator

As far as downloadable files, precious few freebies seem to be available. I did find a nice set of faces in .png format at CuddlyBuddly.

If you want to buy designs for Cricut, there’s really only one choice in SVG format, and that’s a package from MyVinylDesigner.com.

MyVinylDesigner sample

Update: Since this original post, svgcuts.com has made a set of svg stick people available as well as a free sample.

Another update:Vinyl-Ready Designs also has a nice set of stick people in svg format.

Yet another update: Here is an incredibly detailed tutorial on drawing stick people with Inkscape. Be aware that this does not use all closed paths so you will need to convert strokes to paths when you are done to get a cuttable file.

A much more comprehensive package is available from unleash.com. It features, standard stick families, as well as angels, Disney fans, ATV-ers and more. It is vector format, but not SVG, so you will have to convert the images. Likewise with this Stick People Clipart package.

And finally, Stick Family! A blog from a stick family stalker.

A giant source of public domain SVG files

Finding art that is legal to use can be frustrating, but here’s a tool for images you can know are OK for just about any purpose. The Open Clipart Library is a repository of SVG files started by the folks that develop Inkscape. It is a growing source for public domain artwork. If you have created original art in SVG format, you might consider uploading it to the open source community there. Some versions of Inkscape have an openclipart import/export feature in the file menu, making it even easier to download or upload images. The disadvantage of the OCL has been the lack of thumbnails and inefficient search tools. But now another site, clker.com has made the contents of the OCL available with thumbnails. The search function is still kinda quirky, but at least you can scan visually to find images that might be cut-friendly.

Screen shot of clker.com

More on using the Paint Bucket in Inkscape

Wow, the response to the first video has been overwhelming, literally. I am approaching my bandwidth limit at screencast and am looking for a different way to host the tutorials. Here is the second video, which shows how to use the Inkscape paint bucket technique to convert a color image into color separated vectors for cutting on your Cricut. If this doesn’t work, please try this alternate site for viewing the video.

New Technique for Making Piecing Patterns in Inkscape

Did you know you can use the Paint Bucket tool in Inkscape to trace a bitmap piece by piece? Well, you can and it’s a fun and easy technique you’ll want to add to your arsenal. Click for part 1 of the video tutorial which covers how to convert a black and white (line art) coloring book page  into vector form for paper piecing patterns you can cut with your Cricut.

Free SVG silhouettes at UberPiglet

For those of you that were frustrated with the earlier vector packs because of the conversion required, you are going to love this site. Uberpiglet.com has an outstanding collection of silhouettes that are already in SVG format. All you need to do is open them up in Inkscape and save the image you want into a new document for import into SCAL.

Some examples include the Safari and Farm Animals set from Spoon Graphics:

and the Transportation Pack from D.A.T.:

There are 15 sets in all covering business people, dancing people, sports, florals and more. SCAL users are going to want all of them!

60 Free Vector Packs and how to use them

From Smashing Magazine comes this awesome listing of some of the best free vector packs available.

The Ultimate Collection Of Free Vector Packs

While the images are beautiful and many are suitable for cutting, few of them are in SVG format. Most are in EPS, PDF or AI format. Newer AI files, as well as PDFs will import directly into Inkscape. When you double click on an EPS file on a Macintosh, it will be converted to PDF automatically and open in Preview. From there all you have to do is save it and Inkscape will make it into an SVG.

Once you have imported an AI or PDF into Inkscape, click on the vector pack and begin ungrouping until you see dotted rectangles around each individual image. To work on an image, drag it off by itself or save it to a new document to do any necessary simplification, color separation or whatever. Once it has been saved in Inkscape you can then import it into SCAL for cutting.

Here’s an example, starting with one of the free vector packs from Designious.com

We open up the EPS version and save it as PDF in Preview, then open it in Inkscape and Ungroup

Then delete everything but the dolphin we were after and saved under a new name.

Hand sketch fill with Cricut markers

As a follow up to the last video tutorial, this time we start with the filled in text and alter it using an Inkscape filter to give it a more hand sketched look. For those of you who are familiar with Illustrator, this gives a somewhat similar effect to the Scribble Tool.

Video Tutorial