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You are here: Home > Community > Lessons > Lesson List > Tracing Letters in PatchDraw - Letter S

EQ Lessons: Tracing Letters in PatchDraw

by Barb Vlack and Angie Maidment

Before drawing the letters in EQ5 we need to get them from Microsoft Word, edit them in Microsoft Paint, and then bring them into EQ5 and start tracing.

Setup

1. In Microsoft Word (or similar word processing program) start a new document and select Arial Black as the font style. Type the desired letter that you would like to trace. For this particular lesson we are going to trace an uppercase "S."
2. Highlight the letter and type in the font size to 200.
3. On the EDIT menu choose Copy or Ctrl+C to copy the selected letter to the clipboard.
4. From the START menu, click on Accesories, and then on Paint, to open MS Paint.
5. In MS Paint, on the EDIT menu choose Paste or Ctrl+V to paste the letter into MS Paint. A window appears that says "The image in the clipboard is larger than the bitmap. Would you like the bitmap emlarged?" Click yes and continue.
6. Click on the Fill coloring tool and click on a color other than black or gray on the color palette bar and click on the letter to change the color of the letter.
7. On the FILE menu choose Save. The letter can be saved as a 24-bit bitmap in the folder of your choice. If you plan on tracing many letters in EQ5, perhaps you would like to make a folder titled "AlphabetBitmaps" and save all your bitmaps in there. Just remember where you saved it!

Setup In EQ

8. In EQ5 open a new project and name it whatever you would like, perhaps "Letters."
9. On the WORKTABLE menu, click on Work on Block.
10. On the BLOCK menu, click on New Block, and then on PatchDraw.
11. On the BLOCK menu, click on Import for Tracing. Find the bitmap that you saved from MS Paint in Step 7 above and click Open.
12. The letter "S" should then appear on the worktable. Center the letter on the drawing board.
13. Click on the Patchdraw tab at the bottom of the screen and you are ready to begin tracing.

Tracing In EQ

I have found that the easiest way to describe how to trace this letter will be to describe a drawing sequence from scratch and not from shapes.

14. Make sure that Snap to Nodes is enabled
15. Click on the Bezier tool for drawing curves. Start drawing curves around the S and connecting the one you're drawing with the previous curved line. Do not worry about being precise about the curve. Just get a bunch of curves that go around the S bitmap. Try to do this in maybe 12 to 14 lines. Be free with your drawing. You're going to Edit it anyway! If anything, draw too few lines since we can always add nodes to create more line segments. But if you end up with more lines than I'm recommending, you can also delete nodes. Don't worry about the strait lines at the end of the S. Draw them as curves for now, they can be converted to strait lines later.
16. Click on the square on the Bezier Edit tool to get the pop-out menu. We've got some work to do.
17. First, rest your cursor on one of the nodes you've just drawn and wait for the label box to appear. Check to be sure you've closed your path. If so, applaud yourself. If not, use the Zoom In tool and go around and inspect each node. This is another good reason why you don't want to have too many nodes. If you find two nodes that are not connected, click on one of the nodes and move it to overlap the other node. You will know they are joined when handles pop out from the junction.
18. Click on the line at the top end of the "S" curve. This is the line that joins the outside outline with the inside outline of the "S" at this point. We want this to be a straight line. Click on the words "to Line" on the menu and the line you drew as a curve will be converted to a straight line. Repeat for the lower end of the "S".
    

    TIP: Sometimes (though it shouldn't happen here), when you convert a curve to a line, the curve adjoining that line segment also converts to a line. No problem. Simply click on that line and click on "to Curve" on the menu and the curve will be restored.

19. Now comes the fine tuning of the curves. Click on each node on a curve and click on the word Smooth on the Edit menu. You will not be able to change anything for the nodes at either end of the line you just converted to Line, and that's as it should be.
20. Use the Zoom In tool to help you see better to edit the curves. Notice that with the conversion of the nodes to "Smooth" the handles from each node will balance each other to make sure the curve is not bumpy at the node. You will be editing by clicking on the curve line and on the nodes as needed. When you click on a node, you will get handles extending from each side of the node. When you click on a line, the handles will be from each end of the line.
21. Add nodes only if you need them. Don't be afraid to Delete unnecessary nodes. You do both of these processes from the Edit menu. I can draw this "S" with 13 nodes. You can have more nodes and have a perfectly good "S", but 13 is something to aim for.
22. Finish up the drawing by deleting the block outline, deleting the imported bitmap, resizing the letter, coloring the letter, and saving your final project.

Have fun and happy quilting!