Tracing Basics 101 Using CorelDRAW

Video and supplemental text courtesy Bob Hagel, Eagle’s Mark

As a video is worth a thousand words, here’s a 4-minute video tracing of a logo. The whole tracing including some refining took me under four and half minutes.

I could use the Corel bitmap tracing tool to vectorize any bitmap. A logo would vectorize quite well with the tool. There are times when I want better quality results or I just want the sharpest objects I can get and will trace the logo.

Step one:

There are three parts to this logo. I begin by tracing the bottom part: the body. Starting from the bottom, I drop nodes at all the points I want to change direction. I drop nodes at the bottom point; next, the left elbow; then the two cuff points. As a result, I have a curve that is about 75% of a circle. I drop my first node halfway around the curve, then, holding the Ctrl key, I drop the next node straight across. The right side is a repeat of the left.

Step two:

Now I want to begin curving the lines to match the logo. Notice after clicking on the shape and curve icons, you see arrows at each end of the node. Instead of maneuvering each arrow, I simply pull on the line toward the middle to curve it in the right shape. I can then move my node or adjust the curve to get it just right. I repeat this step until I get to the large curve that circles the head. I pull the line straight down and move each arrow straight toward the bottom to get the curve of a circle.

Step three:

The bowl at the top has rounded edges on each side. Note where I lay down the nodes. A node near where the lines begin to curve and one at the end of the sharp curve. If you pull each arrow out matching the line it is coming from, you should have a pretty good match of this curve.

The head is a simple circle and I use the circle tool to make this object.

-Bob Hagel, Eagle’s Mark