Still need help, sorry

[BRYAN REDFORD]

THANK YOU ALL FOR CLEARLY CLOUDING IT UP FOR ME..LOL

I REALLY IM TRYING TO LEARN ALL THIS...I GUESS I NEED TO WATCH SOME ONE OR HAVE A STEP BY STEP INSTRUCTION SHEET ON EXACTY WHAT TO DO...
I HAVE COLOR PICTURES (GOT OFF THE WEB or my own from camera)
THAT I WANT TO ENGRAVE ON TO ACRYLIC...
SOME AREAS I WANT TO SEE THRU...AND SOME AREAS I WANT TO BE RASTOR CUT(white, filled in)...HOW DO I DO THIS ?? COREL X4

because when i do it...it comes out all pix-alated and not sharp edges

PLEASE HELP AGAIN !!!

BRYAN
BBRED721@YAHOO.COM (BBRED721@YAHOO.COM)

[Scott Shepherd]

Bryan, that's a question with complex answers. I'm afraid it's not as simple as it sounds. There are things you (and we) need to know about it, like what machine you are running, what are ALL of the settings you used?

Also, we need to know the size and resolution of the photo. You can't take a small, low quality photo and make it large and have it look nice. You have to start with a good quality photo.

If you give us your machine type, settings, and upload a photo of your poor results, then we can better help you.

[Mitchell Andrus]

These tutorials might help (searched for 'Corel trace'):

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=corel+trace+tutorial&search_type=&aq=0&oq=Corel+trace

It's a marathon, not a sprint. Pour a tall drink, get comfy and play with your tools. You can also do a Google search for the Corel forum. More experts there as well as links to some spectacularly helpful sites.
.

[Doug Griffith]

One of the first things that needs to be done is to clarify what you're working with and be on the same page with terminology.


I HAVE COLOR PICTURES (GOT OFF THE WEB or my own from camera)
If off the web (and possibly your camera), the resolution is going to be 72 PPI. To get a crisp image, this is too low. You want around 300 PPI.


THAT I WANT TO ENGRAVE ON TO ACRYLIC...
This is obvious.


SOME AREAS I WANT TO SEE THRU
This must mean "not engraved".


AND SOME AREAS I WANT TO BE RASTOR CUT(white, filled in)
This must mean "engraved". "Raster cut" is just confusing things.


HOW DO I DO THIS ?? COREL X4
This is where we need to know the equipment you are using and the image you are trying to engrave.


because when i do it...it comes out all pix-alated and not sharp edges
This will happen with 72 PPI images.

[Tom Bull]

The very most basic steps in photo engraving:
1. good photo
2. edit photo using corel, sometimes both corel draw and paint (usually remove background clutter either by making a vignette, or I use powerclip a lot-use google to find tutorials on both) have size already adjusted
3. invert if on glass or black
4. convert to 8 bit grayscale bitmap (use the export command)
5. run through photo-grav software, or one of the methods other creekers use. Just engraving a regular photo will not work right.
6. import the photo-grav result back to corel, position it on page, and send to engraver.

I have been engraving part time for 2 1/2 years and still learn something new nearly every day about photo editing and corel. My first photos would take me hours to prepare, now a simple one takes minutes. Spend a lot of time looking at you tube tutorials (I like alexis galves), read up on Roy Brewer's stuff, get tips from core unleashed web site, read old threads here at smc.

If you know how to post photos of your results you will get better answers to you questions.