CorelDRAW for Skinners, Part 1.

Paul,

Thank you very much, I learned a lot and look forward to the rest.

CorelDRAW is a definite "yes" for me.

Darn Darn Darn!!! For some reason the full videos aren't playing for me. I've both downloaded them to winamp and tried to just open them from the folder and with either option I get only a partial video. But I have to say, that what I've seen so far is quite interesting and informative.

I have a feeling though that if I could just get the full video I should be able to use my Photoshop program. Now, just to get the full videos!!

Anyways, I would also like to thank you Paul for putting these together. It's very generous of you to give us your time and effort.

These videos are in Windows Medea Video format, you should be able to play them in Windows Medea Player.

Paul -

What you're doing with this series is awesome. Thanks for sharing your knowledge so generously.

Cheers,
Daiwa

It's people like you, Paul ..that make Wincustomize a great site to be a part of. These tutorials and video's have been a godsend. I've saved every one of these so far ...so that even when offline, I can refer to these at any time.

I appreciate the effort you've gone to ~to put these together.

Thanks

These videos are great ...

I just have one question regarding exporting the image to bmp...

say for instance, I draw a titlebar for a skin, and I wish to export it to bmp to use in skinstudio... however, I want to limit the titlebar's height to 35 pixels. I can go under the settings when i save and say height 35 pixels, but what that really does is shrink everything, and in some cases blurs up my original image. So what I was wondering is, how can you draw an image to be a certain number of pixels high or wide so that when you export it, you get the size of the image you want?

I have to admit that exporting the bitmap is CorelDRAW's weakest link. I have reported several time a few bugs in the exporter that make it almost useless to skinners, and they have not been fixed. However there are several work around. Here are the ways I have found to get the best results.

Overall note:
    When you design set your general DPI to 300, you can do this in the options dialogue. This is important to the way it makes drop shadows and how it exports and always do your work at a 1" = 100pixels scale. so when I want the finished Icon to be 128 pixels, I will design it in a 1.28"x1.28" box.

Exporting Icons:
    1) I seam to get the best results exporting Icons using the PNG file exporter. You can also use PSD to go results, but I like PNG. You will also notice that I alway have a box around my Icons, that is a fixed square, before I export it I set its fill and outline to none.
    2) Now marquee select the Icon, and the box. Hit export. In the export dialogue make sure export selected only is checked. And select The PNG export filter.
    3) Now there will be several check boxes, make sure Transparent Background is checked. and that your DPI is 300. (I use RGB 24 bit)
    4) In the next dialogue you will see a check box that says Masked Area, make sure you have that selected, and hit ok. Save the file were you want.
    5) The result will be (if you were using a 1.28x1.28 box as a guild) a 384x384 bit map. That you should be able to use in any Iconmakeing program. Most of the time without any touchup.

Exporting Skin Graphics:
    This can be a bit more work. But the steps are pretty much the same as above. Fallow the same guidelines as above. 300dpi, 1"=100" pixels when designing. I am usually not happy with the results Corel gives me if I export a image at a 1 to 1 scale, so what I always do is export it at 300dpi, like the icons. And use a graphics program like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, to resize the Graphics to 100dpi. This will give you the proper scaling. And if necessary cropping.
   
I will add a exporting video to my list of tutorials. and try and do make this clearer.

Thanks for the reply I tried it and it works well, for most images, although images which have a lot of parallel lines close together do not size down as nicely as I could wish

And one other question: how can you cut out a hole in a mesh fill object? I can make an object that has a hole in it by drawing rectangles and then intersecting them, but once i intersect two objects, the mesh fill no longer works. If I try to draw to rectangles, and first mesh fill them, the option to intersect is no longer present... I guess you could workaround this problem by copying the area underneath the hole and bringing it to front, but is there a more direct way to cut holes in mesh fill objects? (For instance, if I were creating a folder icon, and I wanted the front of the folder to have a small glass window through which the back of the folder is visible.)

there are alot of ways, I try and just design stuff like that as more then one mesh. But if you want a Hole, you can draw the overal shape. and powerclip the mesh fill inside it. This can come in handy for otherthings. I will tutch on this more as the Icons continue.

Too bad my Corel 12 crashes all the time when trying to open or save anything... Any clue ?

I know it has some memory leaks. I have been useing 11. Also, make sure you have any service packs installed. Save often. Not saying that Corel Dose not have problems. Maby by the end of these totorails Corel Will notice me and listen to some of the bugs I send in.

I hope so. Gone back to Version 11 SP2 and it runs like a charm.

... im using corel draw 12, it does crash a lot, but when i get the error window that says corel is no longer stable, i just ignore it and cancel and everything still continues to run (do NOT select the option to back up file and restart corel... the file wont open :\).

Thank you. Looking forward for more videos.

Any chance of a Photoshop/Illustrator Icon Developer set...or maybe cross reference???

Another great read!!

Please how do i get rid of the rings when i apply the blend, am new to corel an dont know the settings for this

Thanks in advance..Stan

Paul- Thank You so much for taking the time to share your experience and talent with us. I have been downloading from wincustomize and others for years, always wanting to return the great favors from all of you creative souls. I just bought a Wacom and some software and have been trying to get started, and just serendipitously (!?!) connected with this tutorial. I am in awe. It's not only what I've been looking for, but tenfold. The background dialog is great!

Thanks for the time and effort you took doing these. I will need to get CorelDraw to follow along with these.