Poor proofs of imported line art

Line art scanned into InDesign CS2 from a Canon CanoScan LiDE 60 scanner looks good the first time it is printed on an HP PhotoSmart 4280 printer, and it looks good on the screen. The second and subsequent times it is printed, especially if the document is made into a PDF, the image degrades significantly, and that degradation is visible on the screen as well. Where is the fault: in InDesign, which accepts the image well? In the scanning software, which has caused no other problems? In the printer, which has caused no other problems?

Joel and Peter --
Thank you for responding to my post. No, I do not scan directly into ID: I scan the object (hand-drawn map or sheet of autographs), then place the object on the destined page, adjusting its size to fit the location I have planned for it. I place it with cmd-D, just as I would with text, but select it from a folder full of all the artwork intended for that issue of the newsletter.
I have been using the software since 1987, when it was PageMaker 2.0 and it was published by Aldus, and it has become increasingly complicated over that twenty-odd year period. When I ask ID to export PDFs (the only thing our printer can handle: he's not a typesetter or an expert in page makeup), it regularly tells me that there are missing links, and I have never bothered to follow up and find out which links were missing. Do I have to?
The Canon CanoScan LiDE 60 does offer me my choice of dpi: 300, 600, and 1200. I have scanned line art at 1200. The scanner also offers me 8-bit or 16-bit output; my bet is that I should be sure to ask for 16-bit.
I have accepted as gospel the ID PDF export compression settings: that is, I have never noticed.
As for Display Performance, I did raise that to its highest setting, and the display on the iMac monitor looked splendid, but the PDF sent to the printer did not.
This issue of the newsletter has just come back from the printer, and my wife will be part of the mailing crew tomorrow. Meanwhile, I'm attaching the indd containing the line art (as well as photographs which I did scan and place, and which came out all right). The line art appears (map) on unnumbered page 8 and (autographs) on page 9.
Don Ludgin ([email protected])

Similar Messages

Photo to line art, help needed

Hello - I'm struggling with a rather simple task: turning this image (http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/3641/limb1.jpg) into basic, b+w, vector line art. I'm not sure of the best approach. I've considered making a grid of squares and warping it to fit the shape, or using the pen to more or less trace the image...unfortunately, the image is poorly shot + lit so I can't use any automated trace tools. I'd love some help if someone knows a good approach!
Necessary info: os x 10.5, CS2.

I assume you have a high res version of the photo. Working in Photoshop, I would adjust levels to bring out the squares. Then use dodge and burn tools to further isolate them (you may have to paint in a couple). Then you can probably get a decent auto-trace. Of course, by then you could have traced it.
To trace it you could simply draw lines horizontally and vertically, in line with the squares, then convert them to a live paint object and fill in the intersecting squares.

Scan a line art

I am a new user of Photoshop--I am running CS5 Extended on my Windows 7 Pro. PC.--I created a vector line art in Corel Draw X5 that I want to scan into Photoshop for painting.can I print the line art on white paper,then scan into PS--If so what format(TIFF,JPG,PSD,etc)--will I be able to select parts of the closed areas of the line art to paint after rasterizing it or bitmapping--my goal is to be able to import vector line art from one application to PHOTOSHOP to paint.

Hi, there is a simple way to get your Corel vector artwork into Photoshop. Save your artwork as an EPS and then open the EPS in Photoshop. This will rasterize the vector artwork, so set the resolution at 300. Also, set the color to CMYK (if you use RGB to do your artwork, you may get some strange color shifting if you switch to CMYK later on).
If you need to select areas of the artwork, use the magic wand tool and create a mask. Be advised that the magic wand can sometimes produce fuzzy edges, so I would create a large version of your vector artwork that can be reduced in size when you're finished. This will help to reduce any fuzzy edges. You can also use the expand/contract feature when you make a selection to futher reduce this effect but it takes practice to get the masking right.

Pagemaker line art loses quality when opened in ID

Hi,
I have a small booklet which I created some years ago in PageMaker 6.5. Each page is 11 x 17 inches black and white. I would like to redo some of the pages and create new ones in InDesign. I have at this point no significant experinece working with In Design.
Initially I was just hopeful to be able to print the old pages from InDesign since the computer with PageMaker is probably on limted time. When I try to open the PageMaker file they do open, but the line art illustrations which were "fine line" art of boat profiles turn into very crude looking art. They look like they were drawn with a crayon. Is there something that is controlling the quality of these illustrations when opened or imported? Is there any way to get back to at least the original quality that I see in PageMaker?
I'd like to have the original pages to at least use as a starting pong.
Thanks,
chuck

Hi
Thank you all for your help. I thought I'd post a short response to what I've since found out and a link that was helpful in doing so. As I said because of my lack of experience both with PageMaker and with InDesign I reslly didn't understand how the original PageMaker files were set up nor did I remember how I originally made them.
Searching, I found this link called "Processing Adobe Pagemaker Files for Conversion to Adobe InDesign". http://www.ideastraining.com/PDFs/ProcessingPgMkrFiles.pdf
It walked me through identifying what I had and how to correct it. It turns out that the page had a number of embedded graphics that had links that were no capable of updating for various reasons. A number of the graphics were also in .gif format which apparently InDesign didn't accommodate. So in trying to open these pages, InDesign dumped the original graphics and only left a crude tiff image which is what I was seeing.
I could try to salvage the sheets, but there are so many small problems that I think it's best to bite the bullet and just redo them. Going through the excercise with the help of the link above, however, 1) educated me in what I really had and 2) helped me to locate the original graphics which were on my computer but I didn't recognize. They were all clearly identified in the Links Manager. I simply didn't realize they had originally been linked. That at least allows me to find the original art then message or convert it as necessary in Photoshop or Illustrator.
I've made a template and now I'm just going to start one page at a time.
I just wanted to post the link above in the hopes it may help someone else.
Again thanks for the quick response and thoughtful replies to my question.
chuck

Best File Format For Online Line Art?

I thought the conventional wisdom was that all line art for the screen should be saved as GIFs, all photographic line art should be saved as JPEGs.
Then PNGs came along and offered an alternative to GIFs.
I've been exploring this because I've been having a problem when exporting line art from Illustrator 8 as a PNG and opening it in Fireworks MX, where it appears washed out.
I did a bit of research among comic strip artists -- the art I'm exporting from Illustrator is a comic strip -- and came up with conflicting results.
Dilbert seems to save black and white line art as GIFs, e.g. http://dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/images/dilbert2008611230313.gif
... But its Sunday colored strips seem to be saved as JPEGs, e.g. http://dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/images/dilbert2008040261966.jpg
Meanwhile Donnesbury seems to save colored comic strips as GIFs, e.g. http://images.ucomics.com/comics/db/2008/db080406.gif
Any thoughts, suggestions?
Thanks.

I assume your line art is drawn as vector art in Illustrator, correct?
As far as I'm concened, the "best file format for online line art" would be .swf, because it would retain its scaleable vector nature, and the Flash Player is most likely embedded in any reasonably recent computer's browser.
But a little simple experimentation would be in order regarding file size. SWF (as exported from Flash, not necessarily AI) is very efficient. But the complexity of the line art could still make a given image require more bandwidth as .swf than as a rasterized version.
The former conventional-wisdom regarding PNG is the old "not supported in older browsers" saw. I see even Firworks's online help still says:
> However, not all web browsers can view PNG graphics.
Personally, I think its way past time to stop cow-towing to outdated browsers and use PNGs anyway. So if it were me, and the nature of my line art required rasterization for online use, I would use PNG for its obvious advantages. But then, my livlihood is not affected by some minority of outdated web viewers not being able to view my PNGs.
I would think that whatever color problems you are having in getting your AI files exported to PNG can be worked out with a little investigation/experimentation. (PNG supports color management profiles, so that alone may be your problem, and may be easily fixed in your workflow.) GIF is by definition limited to a subset of colors. JPEG is by definition a lossy compression format. So there are certainly precise color-accuracy issues with those overused formats, too.
But again, that's just me. What little I do in web graphics that would involve this issue doesn't really affect my livelihood. Lowest-common-denominator compatibility may be more important to you.
> Gilbert seems to...
> Doonsbury seems to...
The two images are very close to the same size (132K & 125K). They both include contone grads. Between JPEG and GIF, I would expect JPEG to more consistently yield acceptable results. Since GIF is limited to an 8-bit lookup table, I would expect aberations such as unwanted banding to be more likely in GIF if the artwork contains many colors and alot of highly-rendered shading.
Since you specify
line art, though, that would rule out contone fills, and you could use GIF with a very small color table.
On the other hand, you do not specify whether you want to use transparency in your line art images. If you do, PNG would be far superior, because it supports true alpha transparency. In a GIF, if you can only make one particular color transparent. So even with line art, if the line art is antialiased at all, you'll have the ugly halos so commonly seen in GIFs when displayed on a wrong-colored background.
The only functional "advantage" that I see in GIF over PNG is its multi-image capability, for quick & dirty frame-by-frame animation. My personal animation efforts focus entirely on Flash/SWF, and use scripted animation whenever possible to avoid frame-by-frame. But I recognize the simplicity convenience of animated GIFs for web banners and those (often-annoying) moving icons and such.
JET

How do I achieve this line art effect?

I'm trying to replicate the design below but I'm not sure if I'm using the correct approach.
First, I used Photoshop to desaturated an image and adjusted the levels. Next I imported into Illustrator and live traced it after tweaking the options.
However, I can't seem to have a nice clean line art like the one above. Do you think that design use another method (maybe manually tracing multiple images using the pen tool)?

that image you show is drawn or mostly drawn. you can use image trace to get some of the shapes you need and recomposition the pieces back together. for example on the image you want to copy, i would take an image of the skyline and trace that. select the silhouette of the skyline and delete everything else. then i would do the silhouette of the bridge. then i would trace with different settings to get a few of the details in the bridge and put them on top. then draw in a few details by hand. things like straight lines.
anyway. short answer is that no, there is no illustrator effect that can give you that. it's a lot of work

How do I 1)use airbrush type tool in illustrator CS4 or 2) use PS4 airbrush tool on vector line art?

That's basically my question in a nutty nut. I am drawing illustrations in Illustrator,
can't find an airbrush tool there, so I export to Photoshop to use that airbrush and the
lines pixelate. I want the clean, vector lines of Illustrator with the yummy fuzzy airbrush tool. In short, can I go back and forth from Illustrator to Photoshop without the line art ping ponging between pixel and vector?

See this PDF for one approach. The subject was really more about exploring ways to exploit Isolation Mode, but it does so in the context of a poor-man's "airbrush" effect.
I want the clean, vector lines of Illustrator with the yummy fuzzy airbrush tool.
In reality, then, you're not wanting vector artwork to look like vector artwork. Here's the thing:
Vector artwork, is by its fundamental nature "hard edged." That's one of its advantages and one of its disadvantages. Soft-edged fuzzy effect (and its sister, texture) is one of the mainstays of raster imaging. It's one of the main reasons why there are two primary kinds of computer graphics.
Historically, soft edges and graduations are primarily done with Blends and Graduated Fills. A Blend is really just a semi-automated stack of multiple paths with incrementally changing color. Grad fills are mathematically-defined variations of a path's fill color across the path. Generally speaking, grad fills are limited to a small set of geometric shapes. For most of Illustrator's history that was a very limited set: linear or radial. So when you needed to render tonal graduations in more elaborate shapes, you employed Blends.
More recently, programs have acquired a newer construct, which is an elaboration of grad fills: Mesh Grads. Mesh Grads are also mathematically-derived and remain as such up to print time--that is, they are vector. They offer more control over the shape of the color transitions. But that control is quite tedious, and is not at all like painting with an airbrush.
That's about the extent of it when it comes to maintaining "clean, vector edges". With skill and discernment, the results can look just as realistic as airbrush work, and it can be entirely vector. But the interface for doing it is not an emulation of painitng with an airbrush.
Far more common than a purely vector tool in a vector drawing program that tries to act like an airbrush is the workaround of applying filters or effects to vector paths. Doing that is not purely vector: It's actually rasterization that is re-applied whenever you edit the paths. If you set such an effect as the current default, then you can draw paths with the Brush tool, the Pencil Tool, or really, any of the vector path tools, and that's about as close to emulating an airbrush in a vector program as you'll get. The PDF mentioned above employs that kind of approach. But you should understand, you're really creating raster images when you do that. It's just that, rather than the raster images being "nailed down", they are effectively deleted and re-created on-the-fly if you edit the paths to which the effect is applied.
Illustrator isn't great at this. Other programs--Xara Xtreme in particular--do it much faster and responsively. But again, even though it retains the lossless editability advantage of vector art, the soft-edged effects are not really vector art. The are on-the-fly rasterizations of vector art.
Look up Blends, Grads, and Mesh Grad in Illustrator's Help files.
JET

Pixelated Line Art in Photo Gallery

Hi
I am designing a photo gallery that externally loads jpegs
via XML. I have an actionscript that allows the jpegs to randomly
rotate at an angle as they load onto the stage. The jpegs contain
mostly logos that are line art. It works great but the images are
pixelated when they are at an angle since they are logos/line art.
I can't seem to find a solution to solve this pixelation problem. I
tried loading gif files instead but for some reason gifs does not
load correctly.
Any ideas? Thanks!

Hi dzedward
Thanks for your reply. I attempted to create an
emptyMovieClip and applied cacheAsBitmap in context of the
actionScipt that already exist in the file. I tried to follow the
examples in the Flash 8 documentation but failed. The photo gallery
I am editing from can be downloaded here:
http://www.ffiles.com/flash/photo_galleries/xml_gallery_2/
Please help. Thanks

Sending line art to Photoshop?

Illustrator CS4 on Snow Leopard.
I have a truly vexing Illustrator problem. It seems like a simple challenge, though.
I have a large black and white vector illustration. There are no grays, only black and white line art.
I'd like to send only the black line art to Photoshop with the white areas treated as transparency.
Photoshop treats the un-filled areas as transparency, while it treats the white Illustrator fills as solid white.
Ordinarily I would simply outline my strokes and do some pathfinder operations to subtract the white fills from the black.
In this instance, though, there are hundreds of paths: blacks above whites in the stack, whites above blacks, etc. so going through pathfinder commands one path at a time seems almost impossible.
I've also tried re-coloring all blacks as Pantone spots and printing a color rip to PDF. Same problem: Photoshop treats white fills as solid white.
So... is there something I'm missing. Is there an easy way to separate my black lines and bring them to Photoshop?

Outline all the strokes and then use pathfinder Merge. Afterwards select and delete the white objects.

Line art problem outputting to pdf

I have a problem with exporting pages of a magazine going to print as pdf, relating to line art placed on the page as a bitmap tiff (typically at 1200 ppi). At present I have a workaround for an annoying problem that really needs clearing up ...
I'm using CS4 InDesign and Acrobat (files prepared in Photoshop). So, high-res bitmap tiff containing line art sized (that is, just placed - no resizing in Indesign) and placed in Indesign, looks fine on the page. Output to pdf using 'export' and the resulting file, when viewed on screen, has a thin line down the right-hand edge of any and all bitmap files.
To ensure no misunderstanding, the 'bitmap' reference is what Photoshop calls it - a bilevel file with black lines in it, which enables me easily to overlay other files such as a photo (because the file is black/transparent) and assign a colour or tint to the bitmap, or even a drop shadow etc. I've used this workflow for years, from Photoshop through Indesign, but the latter always gives me this line on the right edge, in the pdf. It did this in CS3 Indesign/Acrobat as well (but never in Pagemaker).
My workaround is to lay a white-filled box over the edge of the file, thus masking it. But of course, that also limits me to where I can place the file - not easily on a graded tint background, not on a photo and so on. So I'd like to solve this.
Any ideas? OS is Win XP Pro (all updates applied to this and the CS programs - I don't believe they make a difference to this problem, as it has existed through several iterations of both OS and CS).
Anyone else seen this effect? Or is it just me? And has anyone a potential solution?
Chris

I think by reason of not knowing what else I can do, I'm heading to the same conclusion - put up with it! I'll certainly try sending a line to print and see if it appears, but for on-screen stuff, I think I have to stick with the safe workaround I use and accept the layout limitations. (Or resort to Pagemaker for the pages that I just cannot do otherwise.)
Seems to me, if people have reported this for years, Adobe might have tried sorting it out. On screen or not, it still must be due to *something* in the file and/or Acrobat/Distiller to allow it to appear. If I create a white greyscale tiff with the same resolution etc, and place it on a page, there's no line down the edge on output - just a white page with a white (invisible) box. If I do this with an 'empty' bitmap file, a line appears ... Both files created in Adobe programs, so it's not me as a user ...
Just me whinging! I'm really coming from the angle that if this is indeed a display problem, it can only be a display problem if there is something in the file for the display to react to (badly phrased that!).
Thanks everyone for your support and ideas - I think that's me finished for now; I have files to upload and then sleep.

Line art filter shimmer

hi all - I have applied the line art filter to a short clip and the effect is perfect when it's not playing - but when it plays there is a shimmer in areas of the image. The clips are 640 X 480, 30 fps, progressive. The FCP timeline setting is for Photo JPEG. They are color corrected for brightness and contrast with a smidge of saturation in FCP and then sent to Motion. I have played with all the parameters with no luck and looked for another filter to reduce the shimmer to no avail.
Anybody know of a way to get rid of this shimmer?

Depending on your settings, the Line Art plugin tends to amplify noise by "outlining" all the differences, which change slightly, frame to frame...
Patrick

Anyone have experience using high-res files (eg line art) in Aperture?

As I found at http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1741287&tstart=0 it seems that Aperture will choke on files over a certain size. I'll grant, I tried something that is outside the scope of Aperture---I tried using it to store a workflow starting with a scan rather than a photo. The scan is higher resolution than most digital photos (as line art must be).
Does anyone have any experience with high-resolution photos or scans? I'm talking over a hundred MB, possibly upwards of a gigabyte. These are precisely the sort of files that I want to create lower-res versions for specific applications and have them be linked to the master file.

I tried to use Aperture with my line art scans in the early versions of Aperture, but gave it up because Aperture did not seem to handle the file size.
Instead I use another workflow for my artwork, Bridge, Photoshop, Illustrator and Version Cue in combination with Extensis Portfolio. This is a very pleasing solution for me and I would recommend it to others to try out as well.
For me, Aperture is used for managing and adjusting my photographs.
Regards
Paul K

Creating line art in photoshop

Hi all,
I have experimented with various tutorials and filters in photoshop hoping to replicate the clean smooth lines of the line art type image below (image based of a photo I presume).
Does anyone know or can provide me with some tutorials on how to do such work.
Any help would be great

Probably done with the Trace function in a vector program.
Similar results are possible but difficult with Photoshop.

Convert photo to line art?

Dear Forum,
I am trialing Elements and Illustrator but cannot find a solution in help or the forums, or any book at Borders, so I hope someone can help. I am looking for a way to convert photos (JPEGS) of flowers to black line art......like a coloring book, not just black and white or grayscale or sylhouette. I will then print out the line art (1-2 pixel black line art) to clear acetate for use as a positive original for creating a silkscreen via photo emulsion exposure (and then silkscreen printing the line art to fabric for hand painting). I am doing this by hand now.....place a sheet of acetate over the photo and outlining "edges" by eye with a fine Sharpie, then using that as the positive original. See attached file for an example. The line art needs to be relatively detailed ( e.g. petals, stamen, leaves) but not absolutely perfect as I only need to print guide lines on fabric for subsequent hand painting. It seems easy to do by "eye", tracing edges of color or tone change, but I have not figured out how to make that happen in Elements or Illustrator. Of course I have only had the trial for a couple days, and have used live trace, posterization, etc, but have not been lucky. Please point me in the right direction. If I can make this happen with an Adobe product, then I will buy it.....I have hundreds of photos to convert. Thanks.....Bob

If you use Threshold, you can add some gaussian blur to the image to make the edges smoother. You can also add a brightness/contrast adjustment layer between the blurred image and the threshold layer to fine tune the edges.
If you have Windows, you might want to look at Medhi's Fine Threshold filter (freeware) found here:
http://www.mehdiplugins.com/english/finethreshold.htm
Edit: You could also use Find Edges on the image first; desaturate it; then use a threshold adjustment layer. Go back to the Find Edges layer and add gaussian blur to taste. To further fine tune, slip a brightness/contrast layer between the blurred image and the threshold to control line thickness/detail. (FWIW, I would make a copy of the Find Edges layer and blur the duplicate so if you change your mind you don't have to start the project from scratch.)

Is there a filter or plug-in for Photoshop CS6 that will allow me to convert a photo into line art?

Image conversion to line art...how in Photoshop?

Good day!
You may want to test the Adobe Illustrator trial.
Regards,
Pfaffenbichler

Poor proofs of imported line art

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