Vectorizing a Logo From an Image

31. To give the lines a slightly heavier weight, I added a Curves adjustment layer. Click Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Curves. In this example the curve was dragged to the shape in the screenshot below. Make sure the Preview checkbox checked so you can see the effect of the curve adjustment in the document window.

32. Below is a view of the image with all the adjustments. The lines look distinct and heavy and easy to trace.

33. In this case I felt it was best to work with a grayscale image in Adobe® Streamline®. The default color settings work well with grayscale images in Adobe® Streamline®. This will be a color separated logo anyway so you can use grayscale for any one color. After it is converted to vector art, we will assign a PMS (PANTONE) spot color to these objects. Click Image > Mode > Grayscale to convert the image to grayscale.

Part II: Trace The Butterfly

34. Launch Adobe® Streamline®, then click File > Open and navigate to the grayscale Photoshop® file to open it. The document window will look something like the one below.

35. Click Options > Color/B&W Setup. The only change from the defaults is to choose "Black & White Only" in the Posterization drop down menu. This is the reason I like to work with grayscale images in Streamline ... it's easy.

36. Click Options > Conversion Setup. The only change from the defaults is to place a check mark only in the Centerline checkbox in the "Methods" box in the Conversion section of the dialog. In this example, the butterfly lines are of uniform weight, so there is no need to trace around the outside of the lines.

37. Next, click File > Convert. The converted art will appear in the document window as shown below.

Note: The conversion may look rough or incomplete, but you should usually expect to do some manual cleanup in a drawing program like Illustrator® or FreeHand®. In the subsequent steps we will be cleaning it up in FreeHand®.

38. Next, click File > Save Art As, then choose a filename and save the vector art to disk. A dialog appears for you to choose the EPS preview option. I chose color. Click OK to save the EPS file to disk.