Magical Art of clip art

If you are engaged in image creation work, then you will certainly fall in love with clip art. It makes your work fun and easy to use. Clip art is an excellent image material, the characteristics of the vector so that it does not lose quality, you can make any combination of them, like building blocks. Today's article is about how to use vector image software to combine bitmap software to skillfully process clip art and make it suitable for your image.

Each person engaged in image creation should not be limited to a single vector or bitmap software, as is commonly said "1+1>2", Vector and bitmap program combined to play a greater effect. They are like your right-hand hand, working together to help you achieve the perfect idea. We are familiar with software, such as the CorelDRAW and PhotoPaint of Adobe's illustrator and Photoshop,corel companies. This kind of cooperation can make up for the shortcomings of each other and make your creation more flexible.

The material is essential for the image creation. It's not just about "use", but more importantly, you can get inspiration from it, nothing more important than that. So we gather all kinds of material. The most satisfying material for me is the clip art of various vector formats. Small size, do not worry about zooming in or out of the deformation, excellent plasticity, so that it alone my preference. However, there is a very troubling problem that often comes before your eyes, and that is, no matter how much material you collect, it is difficult to have a picture that fully meets your requirements. Most of the time, when clip art is placed in your image, the color mismatch makes your work a supplement. From a lot of material to pick out a few can use even if the luck is good, want to eat ready-made, the possibility is almost zero. No way, we had to reinvent ourselves. Today, with a simple technique, we can easily use illustrator and Photoshop to get rid of this "chicken" situation. Let's take a clip as an example and see how we can make it fully integrated into your work. Of course, you can also use other vector and bitmap software combined, such as CorelDRAW and PhotoPaint, to complete the work.

In the first example, we'll use a piece of existing clip art to process a simple dance course poster.

1. Customize your clip Image color

When I start to design my work, the first thing to do is to create a color swatch that matches the color of the final work and save it with the work. This allows you to use standard colors without worrying about color deviations. And it's safer than putting the color in the swatches. The picture below shows the color palette I created for this work. This requires you to be confident before you create. (Figure 01)

Figure 01

2. Open your clip art in a vector program

After the Swatch is finalized, the next step is to process the clip image. To match the work, I found a pas de deux clip art. It is more suitable for our work, but the color difference is too great, and this background is not what we need. In this example, we use Adobe Illustrator to open this clip. (Figure 02)

Figure 02

3. Use the vector program to extract the part you need from the clip art

First, select the Object>ungroup command from the menu to group all objects. Select the background section you don't need, delete it (Figure 03), select all the remaining objects with the selection tool, and group them. This is the object we extracted. (Figure 04)

Figure 03

Figure 04

4. Placing vector objects in bitmap software

Once you have completed the object extraction in the vector software, the next step is to place it in the bitmap software so that you can paint it again and save it in another image format. Open Photoshop, create a new document, and then, from Illustrator, select an object that is already a group, copy it to the Clipboard, return to Photoshop, and paste the object into the new document. When you post a vector object into Photoshop, the object is not raster yet, and it is still a vector attribute. A shape box appears around the object, which is the role of resetting the placed object to size. Drag the handle and border of the stereotypes box to scale the object so that it fits your image. While dragging, hold down shift to maintain the aspect ratio of the image. Then press enter and the image is raster, becoming a layer in Photoshop. (Figure 05)

Figure 05

5. Add Fill Background

Next, we'll add a simple background to the image. Its purpose is to foil the object, so a simple monochrome shape can meet the requirements. You can use the Pen tool to check out the path, or using the vector shape tool in Photoshop. Set the foreground color as we set the yellow-green in the first step to fill the path or shape layer. If you use a path, you need to create a new layer under the dance layer, filled in here. or place the shape layer directly beneath the dance floor. Adjust the background color block and the position of the image, so that it serves as a foil. (Figure 06,07)

Figure 06

Figure 07

6. Trim the extra image

As you can see, the previously created document size appears to be too large after we have finished all of the image elements. In this step, we're going to trim the extra blank document around the image. You can trim the clipping box with the cutting tool in the toolbar, but this method is not very accurate. A more desirable approach is to use the trim commands below the image. We want to intercept the opaque pixels in the image, including the dance layer and the background color block layer, so, we hide the background layer (the white default background layer), select based on transparent pixels from the Trimming dialog box, and there are gaps in the top and bottom of the image, so we will choose all the tops, bottoms, left and right to fix them. (Figure 08)

Figure 08

7. Color the layer with the hue/saturation tool

Now, we need to change the image color of the dance layer so that it fits in the overall image. First, we select one of the colors in the swatch as the foreground color. Make sure the Hue/Saturation dialog box is selected in the dance layer and the coloring button is checked. At this point you will see that the hue of the image becomes the foreground color you choose. In this picture, we choose dark purple. Adjust the Saturation slider, control the color degree of the image; The lightness slider changes the brightness level of the image pixel. In this image, Hue is 300, saturation is 25, brightness is-25. (Figure 09)

Figure 09

Save it in GIF format and now we can use it in our work. (Figure 10)

Figure 10

The second example is simpler, and we'll use the Lasso tool and the hue/saturation tool to change the color of a piece of clip art.

In the previous example, we changed only one color in the clip image. This time, we are no longer limited to the Duotone mode of the image, the entire layer using a color. We will color the different parts of the image separately. The image to the left of the following figure before the color is changed, and to the right is the image after the change. (Figure 11)

Figure 11

To match the Lasso tool to select different areas of the image, we need to enlarge the image enough to see the details. Then select the Lasso tool to select the area where you want to convert the color. Because the hue/saturation tool colors The image according to the brightness value of each pixel in the selection, you can confidently choose the black contour without deliberately avoiding them, because even within the selection, only those light-colored pixels are affected. If your image is magnified to see pixels, it is best to select the Polygon Lasso tool, click at each corner, and then close the selection. To select a selection of the same color, press shift so that the same color area is selected at the same time, and the color is changed together. (Figure 12)

Figure 12

Once you have selected the area, you can use the hue/Saturation tool to color the image again. This process is basically the same as our previous example. If your constituency is small, you can hide the selection with ctrl+h so you can see the image more clearly. This method is used to recolor all parts of the image. Changes in this way only the color of the image, the details of the light and shade are preserved. Now, you can use this image in your work. (Figure 13)

Figure 13

In the third part, we'll put together a few different pieces of clip art to make a picture of what we need.

Most of the time, whether it is cutting or changing color, is not enough to get a piece of satisfactory material. We have to think of other ways. Here's a way of capturing the parts you need from different pictures and putting them together. Let's take a concrete look at the following.

First or the color swatch to determine the tone of the image. (Figure 14)

Figure 14

The next step is to select the material. We've got three images, each of which has the elements we need. Luckily, the first two pieces of clip art were the same style, and the chain image was similar to the previous image. You can also use different styles of images, as long as the combination to ensure coordination on the line. (Figure 15,16,17)

Figure 16

Figure 17

After selecting the footage, we want to combine the parts we need. Similarly, in Illustrator, open these images, solve the group, delete unwanted parts, put the rest of the pieces together, and rearrange the group. In this example, we pick the characters from the first image, select the computer from the second image, and the third image removes the iron ball, leaving only the chain. By grouping them together, you become a new image. (Figure 18)

Figure 18

After you complete the composition in Illustrator, you can copy it to Photoshop and repaint it in the way you just did. Replace the discordant colors to fit the final work. (Figure 19)

Figure 19

You can also make other modifications to it. such as adding shadows. In the end, you can use it in your work. (Figure 20)

Figure 20

The third approach is actually a combination of the first two methods, but you obviously need more imagination. In this way, you will not worry about finding the right material.

Finally, after you've collected a large number of vector-formatted clips, it's a good idea to look for a vector-graphic viewing tool. Some formats, such as. wmf, can be viewed directly with ACDSee, but the. cdr and. ai format images cannot be viewed with bitmap tools. Although the latest version of the software has a preview function, but if not upgrade it? A good vector preview tool is still essential.