Raster to vector conversion - who do you use?

[Dottonedan]

Bahahahaha..... Dan I Googled everything you wrote and nothing!! Dan your work speaks for its self but like these folks I am dealing with will not pay what a good artist would charge but on the other side they expect a great job. I am sure you have delt with them before. Maybe they will change there mind on the theme....

[mk162]

Dan, send me the file, with the digital printer...I can start a clothing line off these things. 

Actually, send me the file, I think that is hilarious

[ZooCity]

I'll take one in a small. 

We do our art in house.  All of it.  I would consider going with Dan or someone for complicated seps but we're o.k. with those too, the seps just take us waaay too long because we're always doing some learning.  Having that ready to go would definitely save us a lot of labor costs.

Vectorization is a breeze once you get to know the editing parameters in Live Trace and anyone with just a touch of illustration skill can fill in where the auto trace leaves you hanging.   I can't see paying (and waiting) for that as a service when it's literally a 15-30 minute job to go from scan to vectorized, paintable art. 

[sportsshoppe]

Dan you are toooooooooo good...lol
I don't think that is exactly what they had in mind but you never know..

[Fresh Baked Printing]

I've offered the service and was trying to determine if I could do enough $10-25.00 jobs in a day to make it feasible to continue offering.  I get about 1 order for jpg conversions about every 30-45 days.

I've never stopped offering it but people don't use me for that type of work.  Maybe the marketing needs work. Maybe in the end, after I look at a job and quote it, I might be twice what others charge that focus on that business but IO really did try to quote competitively to get a good read. Just not enough work came my way with it to get a read. With as few that i got, I could turn them next day even with my regular work load. So, it's an odd market. At the same time, not as creatively rewarding either. Very production oriented but the faster you get at it, the more $.

Really tho, I've done some of those jobs at $10-$25.00 and those people can end up making maybe $6.00 per hour on some and $60.00 an hour on very few.  At one point, That type of work is what I did for a living. I could do 15-25 jobs a day.  15 jobs at $15.00 each is $225.00 per day. Not bad. I need a good deal more than that but it would balance out with my other work.

I've used you a 2 or 3 times and was very happy. The fact that your email domain doesn't match your web domain is kinda annoying though 

[Dottonedan]

I'll take one in a small. 

We do our art in house.  All of it.  I would consider going with Dan or someone for complicated seps but we're o.k. with those too, the seps just take us waaay too long because we're always doing some learning.  Having that ready to go would definitely save us a lot of labor costs.

Vectorization is a breeze once you get to know the editing parameters in Live Trace and anyone with just a touch of illustration skill can fill in where the auto trace leaves you hanging.   I can't see paying (and waiting) for that as a service when it's literally a 15-30 minute job to go from scan to vectorized, paintable art.

I think that it's a matter of how much of this work you have. If you can do a few of these a day yourself thats great. If you begin to be a shop that gets 10 of these in a day (lucky you), then you are going to want to send them out. 15 min. is nothing unless you don't have 15 min available.

[Sbrem]

We do our stuff in house. I particularly like to use PhotoZoom to enlarge jpegs before I start cleaning them for vectorization, if I actually need vectors. It's usually easier to make channels in PS and import into Illy, for me anyway. But, I did have some seps done by Dan for a rush job when we were buried and of course, they were top notch. Of course, we have 2 in house artists, plus I can help when needed, though I try to only do a little. As someone else mentioned, I really should be doing something else instead of production.

Steve

[Dottonedan]

I've used you a 2 or 3 times and was very happy. The fact that your email domain doesn't match your web domain is kinda annoying though 

Really?  I never gave it much thought. Are you pulling my leg?  I just never got that email thing to work in my website. Who's got time to mess with that stuff?

[ZooCity]

It's usually easier to make channels in PS and import into Illy

Been doing more and more of this, with less errors as we go.  I used to vectorize everything and sep from Illy but now I'm simply requiring art at print size 350ppi or higher and I'm liking PS > .dcs 2.0 > Illy > Accrurip a lot. I wish there was a way to '86 the composite cmyk and view the spot colors more accurately once placed though.

I think the worst are sponsor logos for back prints- 72dpi web clips all the way.

[Frog]

I think the worst are sponsor logos for back prints- 72dpi web clips all the way.

That's often only until they receive a bill for a re-draw. Then they send you the same file that they have on their computer for all of their brochures, fliers and menus and things.

[Sbrem]

It's usually easier to make channels in PS and import into Illy

Been doing more and more of this, with less errors as we go.  I used to vectorize everything and sep from Illy but now I'm simply requiring art at print size 350ppi or higher and I'm liking PS > .dcs 2.0 > Illy > Accrurip a lot. I wish there was a way to '86 the composite cmyk and view the spot colors more accurately once placed though.

I think the worst are sponsor logos for back prints- 72dpi web clips all the way.

That's almost exactly what we do now, except we keep the RGB channels as well, and save as a PS file. Then imported into Illy, you get the RGB pretty preview, but only the select the spot color channels in the print dialog. True, it's not the spot channels preview, but it's much better than the DCS color composite...

Steve

[GraphicDisorder]

I use Vector Magic.  Love it.

[Prosperi-Tees]

I use Vector Magic.  Love it.

Did you buy the license for it or month to month? Have you ever used there hand tracing service?

[GraphicDisorder]

I use Vector Magic.  Love it.

Did you buy the license for it or month to month? Have you ever used there hand tracing service?

I bought it,  I think it was like $500. 

[Frog]

If I remember, they have stand alone software (like you have) month to month subscriptions, or  credits to buy and exchange for individual jobs, right?