When Adobe Illustrator first presented the Live Trace (LT) feature to the public, I remember how fine a tool it was, and still is. However, this new feature paved the way for a digital design trend that was abhorred. At that time, it seemed that all photographs were applied with Live Trace. Many of these Live Traced images, which were seen on digital graphics magazines, looked like “paint-by-numbers” paintings done by pre-schoolers.
Many digital designers of that period maintained that the resulting images done with Live Trace show their own styles. When the truth was, it was either due to talent and drawing skills deficiency, or the fact that they cannot make respectable images. Whatever the reason was, fortunately, the trend vanished. But in its place, another flimsy development ensued. Anyhow, the bad experience with Live Trace stayed with me.
It was a long time before I rediscovered the potentials of the tool, specifically when used in Photoshop or Adobe Illustrator. I found that Live Trace is helpful in translating black and white images into paths. It was not only effective, it was also easy. The Pathfinder Palette in Illustrator is a great tool especially when dealing with colors and abstract shapes.
I know that Photoshop can make most of the path area and shape operations I mentioned above. I felt, however, that it is more invigorating to use the Illustrator for these procedures. I could not really fathom why I felt that way. Maybe because I was not looking at the whole picture, but was only focused on these individual elements – who knows. But my trials with the Pathfinder, together with the use of the Live Trace tool from Illustrator, allowed me to venture into a new, albeit, strange, way for my designing.
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