Straighten/Clean Up Live Paint Lines?

Hello all,
I have been free-hand drawing sketches on paper, scanning them, and importing them into Illustrator. Then I use live trace and paint and *viola*--I've got my vector image.
Only problem is, the scetches don't contain perfectly straight lines. Additionally, I go over the scetches in a chisel-tip marker before scanning, and, depending on the angle of curvature for some lines, the width of the ink varies greatly thoughout the image.
Is there any way to:
1. Straighten up sections of the live paint lines?
2. Thicken only portions of a live paint line (to better balance out the ink width issue)?
3. Smooth out choppy "stair-step" looking lines?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
C.G.

There's more to it than clicking "Trace" and saying "voila." Try experimenting with the Trace options dialog box. Change the Corner Angle to 0 for starters. This will give you a base of straighter lines.
After the the trace is expanded, go to Object>Path>Simplify and choose "Straight lines. See how that looks.
Lastly, if you're not too keen on the Pen tools, go over the vector lines with the Smooth tool (under the Pencil).

Similar Messages

How do you connect lines for a drawing in order to use the live paint bucket tool?

Hello! Im fairly new (okay not really) to using adobe illustrator
I used the Image trace tool to outline this drawing of Captain America but unfortunately the lines arent connected and therefore
messes up my colouring completely when I use the Live Paint Bucket tool.
Is there a way to connect the lines so they are closed when I colour it? Or is there another way to color this drawing?
Help would be greatly appreciated!

Those gaps are very wide. Draw some paths and apply no fill, no stroke to them.
Then make the live paint. In case the live paint already exists, you can go into isolation mode and then draw the paths. Or draw them and use Object > Live paint > Merge

Thin white line between line art and live paint fill?

I am using live paint to paint cartoon character illustrations. The artwork is brought into Illustrator CS3 and live traced. Then I convert it to a live paint group and use the paint bucket to fill. Everything looks fine no matter how much I zoom in. If I bring the AI file into Photoshop CS6 I can see a thin white line between the black line art and the fill. This is most noticeable where black meets black. I can also see this sometimes in file previews while browsing through files. If the white line cannot be seen in Illustrator is the file ok? I did just upgrade to CS6 if that would make a difference.
Thank you for any help.

If the white line cannot be seen in Illustrator is the file ok?
Without knowing specifics,nobody knows.
"Okay" for what?
If it looks okay to you in Illustrator, then it's okay for viewing in Illustrator.
If the export of it does not look okay in Photoshop at 1:1 or higher zoom, then it's probably not okay for whatever you're going to do with that raster image.
If it's printed to a low-res composite printer, then it may be okay, because the printer may not be able to resolve the whitish pixels.
If it's printed for commercial (color-separated) reproduction, it may not be okay, depending on the scale at which it will be printed, and on other considerations partially described below.
The autotrace routine does not build traps. Typically, when you color-fill cartoon line art manually, you don't make the shapes that define the fills merely "kiss" the black line work, as would the default treatments of a stupid autotrace. The black line work typically overprints the fills, thereby creating printing traps.
Suppose a portion of your cartoon is a hand-drawn closed circle. The black line work is irregular; it varies in width, having been drawn with a marker or a brush. The circle is colored in with a medium green. There are no sloppy gaps in the original between the green and the black.
You scan it and autotrace it. Unless you apply some deliberate care to make it do otherwise, the autotrace is going to create a compound path, filled with black, and with no stroke; and a green simple path which (hopefully) exactly "kisses" (abuts) the black path. Adobe's on-screen antialiasing of the edge where the two colors abut may or may not cause your monitor to display a faint whitish or grayish sliver between the two colors.
Similarly, Photoshop's rasterization of it, or the rasterization of a raster export filter may do the same, and may actually result in some off-color pixels along the edge. (Your description of the scenario kinda raises the question of why you are auto-tracing something that you're then just going to rasterize in Photoshop anyway. Why do that? Why not just work with the scan in Photoshop?.)
So let's leave Photoshop out of the picture and assume you are autotracing it because you want vector artwork. You zoom way in to see if the whitish sliver enlarges. It doesn't, so you assume it's just an aberation of Illustrator's on-screen antialising. And then someone tells you you're in the clear. But are you? Not so fast.
Let's assume the artwork is destined for commercial (color-separated) printing. Further assume the color of the autotraced black is 100% K, and the color of the autotraced green is 100Y 50C. Three inks involved. None of those three inks are shared between the two objects. So even if the paths do, in fact, perfectly abut, there is no "wiggle room" built in for the minor alignment shifts that almost aways do occur on press.
Bottom line: Even if you do determine that the common antialiasing aberations that frequently occur on-screen in Adobe apps is just that—just an onscreen aberation, that does not necessarily mean your file is suitable for commercial color-separated reproduction.
First, you need to understand that autotracing is not the one-click, instant "conversion" of a raster image to vector artwork that far too many think it to be. Just like everything else, you don't just launch a program like Illustrator, start autotracing things willy-nilly without understanding what's really going on. Just like anyting else, you can use an autotrace feature intelligently or...well...not.
You have options. Illustrator provides an auto-trapping feature. Read up on it in the documentation so you understand what it's all about. Alternatively, you can expand the results of your autotrace, select all the black linework and apply a composite color that includes 100% K and reasonable percentages of C, M, and Y (a so-called "rich black"). Or,depending on the artwork and the desired results, you may consider doing the autotrace as centerlines so you have stroked paths, not just filled paths for the linework. That way, using the flood fill (so called LivePaint) will cause the auto-created fill objects to extend to the paths, not just to the edges of their strokes. Then set the linework to overprint.
At any rate, if you are doing this professionally, you need to read up on the principles and practices of trapping and color separation.
JET

How can I reduce the number of lines in live paint?

I'm trying to use adobe illustrator to color the background of a photograph green while keeping the person in the picture the same color.
I used live trace to get a vector image and then attemped to use live pain to finish the job, but I end up with thousands of blue lines and gaps that are too small to color in. Is there anyway i can reduce the number of gaps so that i can actually paint the background?
I've already tried the gap options and adjusting the settings to small medium or large did nothing.
If this isn't possible, is there any other feature in adobe illustrator that would allow me to achieve my goal?
I have a photograph with a person in the middle; i want the person to remain the same and the background to be changed to green.
Thanks for your time.

Would be easiest to fix this when tracing.
You could try the magic wand tool to select them (but you'll have to expand the live paint object)

Live paint bucket not including all lines

I'm creating a map with different shaded regions and have tried several times but the Live Paint tool is not including all the lines. There is a large area that is showing up as a single region, and all the other lines included in that area that should be designating different smaller regions seem to be ignored. am I doing something wrong? Thanks to all responders.
Leslie

Double Click the Live Paint tool when the dialog shows up check paint strokes which is off by default

Live paint to image without covering lines in image?

I am using Live Paint in CS5 after tracing a line drawing, and I am finding that I am able to apply paint to the image, though it is covering up some of the lines. How canI apply the paint while making sure that the lines are not painted over?
Thanks.

Define "lines."
You can set options for whether the LivePaint tool applies fills or strokes separately. But the usual beginner's results of autotracing (LiveTrace) doesn't contain strokes. What the user thinks of as strokes in the original image are rendered as fills by most of the default autotracing presets.
JET

Live paint seems to make lines thicker

I'm new to illustrator, and I'm having some issues with the live trace and live paint tools.
When I use live trace, my image looks exactly as it should. However, when I change the image to a live paint group and then begin to change some of the colors, the lines seems to get thicker.
Why does the image look okay after being traced, but changes once made into a live paint group?

5) Click on one of the black lines in the image and change color to Pantone Black C
You haven't described at all what settings you used for the autotrace, or what kind of objects you have after expanding it. Are the black objects filled, stroked, or both?
Also, the LivePaint tool can apply Fills and/or Strokes, depending on how you set its options. Based on your description, you may be applying black strokes to the autotraced black-filled paths. That would, of course, result in "thickening" what you are calling the black lines.
JET

How to feather lines of live paint group to achieve custom shadows?

Hi all,
So I'm pretty sure you can't actually feather lines in a live paint group, but I don't know how else to do this. I have a picture all colored in with live paint group and stuff, and I want to add shadows to certain shops, much like the apple has shadows on it in this tutorial from adobe (http://help.adobe.com/en_US/illustrator/cs/using/WS714a382cdf7d304e7e07d0100196cbc5f-61d8a .html). I tried making a live paint group on a new layer and then feathering it, but that feathers everything, I only want one edge feathered.
Sorry if I'm not being super clear, it's a lot like the black shadowing on that apple.
Thanks

Yopu would have to expand the relevant parts so you get separate objects for further treatment....
Mylenium

Why is Illustrator's 'Live Paint' ruining my lines?? please help.

I am new to illustrator but i have managed to get around the basics of creating and coloring illustrations. The other day i created a nice image fine without any problems. But today, when i highlight my image and go to Object>Live Paint (so that i am able to use the live paint bucket tool and color the image). it just screws up the lines and makes it look weird.
Before: http://s3.postimg.org/pnywj9f8z/rffref.png
After Live Paint: http://s21.postimg.org/ywg20q9x3/safuqq.png
Why is this happening?

You used thw width tool to create the lines?
Live paint won't work with anything else than plain strokes (or no strokes at all)
What you can do:
- expand the varibale width strokes
- make a copy of the artwork (so you can keep the live variable strokes) and then live paint the copy

Is it possible to apply path styles to live paint objects or clipping paths?

Hey everybody! I tried searching for the answer online, but couldn't find what I was looking for...
I want to create an illustration with black outlines. Within these outlines I want to have some spots without outlines that stay clean within the lines. I have tried 3 options so far and have found a solution but it's far from ideal.
1. Create clipping masks for each element that has a spot on it and assign a stroke to the clipping path again after. However by creating the clipping path, the path styles dissapear. In this case I want to keep the pointed ends to the open path outlines (see top image).
2. Draw in the lines where the spots are and create a live paint object of the entire illustration. Then paint in the spots and other areas. However when I create this live paint object the lines again lose their applied styles and even 'end' at each intersection, creating nasty edges where the lines should go 'underneath' smoothly (see bottom image).
3. The option Im using now. Duplicate the path outlines and create clipping masks for the spots without strokes. Then put the stroked outline with the desired styles on top. The problem with this is that I have almost twice as much elements in my illustration now than I actually 'need'. And the styled outlines are not connected with the color underneath, so its very easy to accidentally move something around...
Does anybody know of an easier way to create this effect without all the hassle? Thanks in advance for you time!

I drew the dark beige shape by pasting a copy in front of the black stroke with light ebige fill. Used the pencil tool to redraw the bottom edge. Then fixed the leaks byusng a blending mode of darken.
I try to keep my illustrations simple using the fewest paths possible, to make future edits easy. Live paint creates a mess, so never use it as I like to control my compound paths and masks.

Live Paint Bucket in CS5

Using Illustrator on a Windows box running XP sp3 with an Intuos 2
I've been using Illustrator CS2 for awhile and have upgraded to CS5. I need some help with a problem I'm experiencing with the Live Paint Bucket. I select the illustration, go to Object > Live Paint > Make and get the Blue bouning box. I choose my Fill and Stroke colors and go to work. It seems to work until I get a closer view, around 800%, and then I notice that the stroke isn't filling in some of the strokes completely (there appear to be gaps within the Path that don't show in a normal view). Its leaving artifacts (I don't know what else to call them) unstroked. I've attached two two examples of these artifacts. I've also tried to correct this with the Live Paint Selection Tool which I'm also having a problem with. I've released the Live Paint group and checked that all my paths connect and have corrected any problems I can see.
This hasn't helped either. Can anyone tell me what I'm doing wrong. I've consulted the Help and either I can't read English with comprehension or........I can't find the correct words to bring up the problem.
I thank you in advance for any help you can give me.

I'll try to help. Since I don't know what you expect to see, it is hard to say what you're doing wrong. The gold line end, in the top left boxed area, can be selected with the Live Paint Selection tool and either deleted or painted with "none". Clicking on the line can be tricking with the selection tool because it tends to select the fill instead. Zoom in and you will see when it's selected, then just hit "delete" or type "/" to assign a stroke color of "none" to the selection.
You can also using the Live Paint Bucket tool to do this. With the Bucket tool active, hold "shift" to highlight strokes, then choose "none" and click. You can scroll through the color choices using the left and right arrow tools.
I'm not sure what you want to change in the center section. Remember, you don't have to release the Live Paint object to make edits to the paths with the pen or pencil tools. They remain fully editable. You can also add new paths to the Live Paint object by either working in "isolation mode" or by dragging paths into the Live Paint object within the Layers Panel.

Convert to Live paint

Hello
I have placed an image into Illustrator CS4 Which I created as line art in CorelDraw X5. I want to use Illustrator to color it.
When I try to make it into a Live paint group, I get the message "The selection contain objects that cannot be converted. Live Paint groups can only contain paths and compound paths. Clipping paths are not allowed."
can anyone show me what I am doing wrong?
Thanks for any help.

Thanks Larry
That information was absolutely priceless!
You were spot on there - I have released the clipping mask and it is now a live paint group. Fantastic!
Regards
Peter.

When do we use Pentool, live paint bucket or brush?

For example, I want to draw a bush
I know there are many different ways to create: some use pen tool, some use live paint bucket tool, some use brush and eraser.
No matter what methods we use, it all leads us to the same result. I want to draw as smart and convinient as much as possible. So I dont understand in which case what method we should use. I am recommended to use basic shapes as much as possible when drawing. But when drawing complex objects, it takes too much time to use basic shapes to create
For example, In this case I think we should use brush and eraser
I think that using pentool can make my work goes faster. But why do people use live paint bucket tool and when we need to use basic shapes to create objects?
Is that right when I said that it depends on what style of art we are creating? (such as logo, flat UI design, artwork for children, ect...)
*Question from a newbie to illustrator TT_TT*

This is the kind of question I like most to see in drawing software forums and it's increasingly rare. So first, let me commend you for thinking in terms of seeking usual and customary best practice, rather than just assuming every whiz-bang, instant gratification cheap trick feature should be employed willy-nilly without ever a thought toward the elegance of your drawing's structure. It suggests you are serious about maintaining quality in your vector drawing, rather than just assuming anything that "looks good" on your monitor is "quality."
Unfortunately, one could write a whole book on this. So I'll try to keep the following general and reasonably brief. That may make it sound a bit preachy. If you want to talk more specifics, continue the thread conversation.
Vector drawing is, by its nature, an exacting medium. It strains against itself when it pretends to be "painterly."
There is, of course, a balance between a strictly purist mindset and real-world practicality. The way to find your balance is to approach automated effects (especially new ones) with a healthy dose of skepticism. Try them, sure; but closely examine the results, tear them apart, and try to understand what's really going on.
Regarding specific features you mention (Live Paint, Brush, Eraser), try them, examine the results, and consider whether the results are what you would expect if they'd been deliberately and efficently drawn. I find that Live Paint and Shape Builder (much the same thing) usually do a decent job of maintaining true-ness to the original paths, matching abutting edges which should be exactly identical without creation of many unnecessary anchors.
I find much the opposite to be true of features like Offset Path, Outline Stroke, and even moreso of features like Variable Strokes. Basically anything that involves automated enveloping (not just Envelopes, but also things like ArtBrushes) are suspect. I'm certainly not saying never use them, but be as aware as you can of what's going on. I leverage Artbrushes and Pattern Brushes to high advantage for certain things, but I do so knowingly, not willy-nilly. I rarely ever acutally use the Brush or Pencil or Blob Tools. I create the artwork contained in the Brushes as cleanly as possible and apply the Brush to deliberately-drawn paths.
Much has to do with the intended practical uses of the final artwork. For example, overlapping paths is standard fare for artwork destined for print. It's a functional deal-breaker for artwork that wil also be used to drive a cutter/plotter for signage. (Just one reason why proper logo master files should be as cleanly constructed as possible.)
Automated routines--no matter how seemingly "powerful"--do not have human discernment. The poster-child example of this is autotracing. An autotracing feature doesn't know a round iris from a hex bolt. The autotracing features of mainstream drawing programs don't even have any geometric shape recognition. So with infrequent exceptions, autotracing is overused pointless junk. It just trades one kind of raster-based ugliness (pixelation) for another kind of vector-based ugliness (shapeless jaggedness).
I know...you didn't mention autotracing. But I mention it as an extreme case of a principle that you can apply to the features you did mention: Ask yourself what a purely mathematical algorithm with zero aesthetic discernment is going to yield in terms of what you would consider elegant execution.
Again, I'll cite a well-known extreme: Anyone who has ever had to deal with auto-generated 2D DXF exports from CAD/CAE programs is familiar with the ubiquitous problem of dealing with thousands of tiny disjointed straight segments meant to represent a curve. Those tasked with handling such drudgery deal with it routinely. Some of them even devise additonal automated algorithms to make a bad situation marginally better. Yes, it "gets the job done." Yes, today's computer hardware can process the ridiculous amount of geometrically unnecessary data without choking. Yes, at the scale at which it will be printed in the parts catalog, the faceted shape will not be distractingly noticeable. But no self-respecting technical illustrator would ever actually draw the same subject that way from scratch, and his far more elegantly drawn-from-scratch result would be far more versatile and robust for multiple final uses.
Your bush example is not so complex as to make drawing deliberately and directly with the Pen impractical. In fact, doing so is much less work than the second example using a bunch of ellipses and applying boolean operations. But maybe you stylistically desire each edge of each blade to be a portion of a mathematical ellipse or even strictly circular. In that case, using automated boolean operations may be justified. But (especially in Illustrator) I would be sure to carefully examine the results. Illustrator's automated path generation routines (Pathfinders, Offset Path, Outline Stroke) have been notorious at various times (versions) for generating ugly and sometimes functionally problematic artifacts such as needless coincident anchors (for just one example).
Your second example of the "scratchboard" style illustration is a case-in-point of situations where we make value judgements and (hopefully careful) compromise between semi-automation and path-drawing purism. You're trying to emulate an expressly non-geometric aesthetic style. The particular example is a good one, because it's a "borderline" example. That drawing is simple enough that it could be drawn entirely anchor-by-anchor, and I would likely do it that way if, for example, it was going to be cut from sign vinyl enlarged to the scale of a trade show background or a wall hanging in an airport.
But if it were only to serve as a one-time placement as a spot graphic in a magazine, I might, for example, create an ArtBrush for certain portions of it, like the selected sun rays, and "let it go" for practical considerations. (Although I'd not deliver it as such; I'd consider it a matter of due dilligence to expand such semi-automated "live" onstructs and check the paths for reasonable cleanness.)
Bear in mind, Bezier-based drawing has been the mainstream for three decades now. We're not "fooling anyone" anymore. There now exists a new aesthetic discernment. Even our audiences are well aware that digital emulations of the randomness of so-called "natural media" are just that; contrived digital emulations. Our audiences view our artwork with a certain skepticism.
And when you put something in print, there's (hopefully, although I often wonder) still the matter of professional pride which bears in mind that our artwork will be viewed not by just the "unsuspecting public" but also by our peers; our colleagues. So you want to avoid any "dead giveaways" of execution by "cheap tricks" which "hurt the eyes" of other vector illustrators. At the scale viewed on this computer in this forum, there are details in that drawing which look like (whether they are or not) the kind of unintentional artifacts commonly generated by path operations and such. Such artifacts don't read as "natural randomness" of the emulated medium (again, we're no longer fooling anyone). They break the stylistic consistency of detail of the overall drawing and therefore look like unintentional but disregarded results of some automated feature.
So anytime you employ an automated path-generating feature, consider it normal to perform some cleanup on the result. Again, an extreme-case common situation exemplifies the principle. I put 3D Effect to use, but I would never deliver the raw results of it as final deliverable vector artwork. Automated features can be used as a rough-out tool; a means to an end, not the final end itself.
JET

Coordinates of paths that border live paint areas

I have several illustrator files that show drawings of neighborhood lot maps. The lots are drawn from single lines where one long line creates the front of all the lots on the street. Another line creates the back and smaller lines divide the lots on the sides. Each line is on its own layer. Each lot is labeled with a lot number. I can create a live paint group and fill in each lot. But this doesn't divide up the front, back and side lot lines for me and create a new shape with the front, back, and side lot lines drawn for each lot. I am wondering if it's possible for a script to do this by:
For each lot fill
Copy the segments of the lines on the front, back and side layers that overlap the lot fill.
Create a new group from those line segments.
This will create a duplicate lot shape that retains the front, back and side line definitions.
I am not a script writer but would like to hire somebody who could write this for me as it would make my world much easier if it can be done with a script!
Thanks in advance.
Rebecca
602/451-7433
rebecca at cibolacreative dot com

Hi Rebecca, like I said, if the lines are not touching it won't work
I made this
if the lines are not touching you won't be able to use the tool, we might need to think of doing something else.

Big problem, Live Paint Bucket changing strokes

Hi all, so in the first picture you can see the finished line work. When I fill the face with a color in Live Paint, it changes the strokes and makes them appear jagged in varying widths, it's especially obvious on the eyes, ears, and hair - it looks like it is applying Pathfinder>Divide. I have the stroke set to nothing when I apply the fill, please help!

how about this?
1. duplicate the lineart and put it underneath the layer and lock the original
2. convert the lineart into an outline stroke by going to Effect>Outline Stroke then Object>Expand Appearance
3. Open Pathfinder Pallete and then select all and Unite/Add it.
4. change everything to no stroke and no fill
5. select all then convert it to live paint
6. deselect the converted path and start using live paint bucket.
7. after that expand it and ungroup so you can move the fill path. also you'll notice that it will remove all path you have been converted.
reply if it works,

Straighten/Clean Up Live Paint Lines?

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