Comments on: Episode 078

By: Schicke Charts in Inkscape : Karl-Tux-Stadt

Schicke Charts in Inkscape : Karl-Tux-Stadt — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 16:17:33 +0000

[...] schöne Charts in Inkscape generiert. Angeregt zu dieser Suche hat mich ein ziemlich alter Screencast. Nützlich ist das Ganze ja schon, aber Gnumeric haben die wenigsten installiert, die Masse [...]

By: Vadim P.

Vadim P. — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 23:33:20 +0000

thank you!

By: Roberto

Roberto — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:42:57 +0000

I did not know that Gnumeric exported to svg … this is great!
Trivia! but is in the repository linus (ubuntu) that program “Key Status”?

By: Zombiebrainz

Zombiebrainz — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 04:29:08 +0000

Merry Christmas folks!

By: Don W

Don W — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 22:24:51 +0000

@RQ- The O>M>S is the least complicated way to go, maybe the only way to have a product that can be used in various ways (transportable). My demo is too restricting but shows another way if text is used. This method could be used if you needed a background "picture" to be used with other Inkscape effects.

(-: And you don’t have to SKEW IT. .

It will be interesting to see what others have to offer.

By: Richard Querin

Richard Querin — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 21:02:47 +0000

@Don – I watched that screencast you sent me. The benefit of using a black-white mask (using Object->Mask->set) is that the reflection is then an opaque-to-transparent one that can be utilized on whatever background you like later on. Even when you export it as a png (which holds transparency). Doing it with a simple black-to-transparent gradient does work – on a black background, but if you wanted to put that text and it’s reflection on a white background later on, the method wouldn’t work. Also, using the black-white mask method lets you create reflections of anything you can group together, such as images, text, paths etc..

The only problem I see with what schrottplatz is suggesting is that the masked object doesn’t hold up very well under the perspective effect. If I could get the perspective effect to work on objects that were masked, I’d do it that way for sure.

By: Don W

Don W — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 20:22:47 +0000

Ref:schrottplatz
I found when I use perspective after gradient, the effect goes away. You can do it by path>combine first, do the perspective then break apart. But on text you have to go back and do the path>difference to get rid of the solid centers of letters. The only advantage to this is that the skew step is eliminated but several other steps are added and you still have to use the mask.

By: Richard Querin

Richard Querin — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 19:23:39 +0000

@schrottplatz – I’ve always been unable to do it the way you stated. I think it’s because the reflection is a masked object. Even if all the objects are paths (including the gradient used as the mask) it screws up if I try and do the perspective. It runs the effect but you don’t get the required result.

I could be wrong, or it could be just my system. I’d like others to try it the way you describe and see if it works for them. If it does, it might definitely be easier.

By: Richard Querin

Richard Querin — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 19:19:35 +0000

@Schnitter

It’s called Shiki Colors I believe. I posted about it in a thread in the Linux Outlaws forum a while back. I really like it. The relevant links are in that post:

http://linuxoutlaws.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1025#p16979

Glad you liked the tutorial.

By: schrottplatz

schrottplatz — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 10:21:37 +0000

your reflection technique is a bit complicated.. you should first make the refelction and after that the perspective thing

By: Schnitter

Schnitter — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 19:49:47 +0000

Great tutorial, liked it

But…sorry, what theme are you using?(And if you have the link, where can I find it? :>)
I saw it sometime and it looks great.

By: eric

eric — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 00:38:42 +0000

If you import more than one graph into Inkscape there are some display bug because many objecs share the same name in their xml file.

To prevent this bug, i save the graphs from gnumeric in pdf and import them in Inkscape without any bugs.

By: Richard Querin

Richard Querin — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:58:16 +0000

At the risk of further diluting this comment thread, here is a neat link that just popped up in my feed reader. It mixes graphic design with Cereal.. I guess…
http://alanvalek.com/blog/2008/12/17/100-cereal-box-covers/

By: Richard Querin

Richard Querin — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:53:03 +0000

Dang neon g, I’m learning more in this set of comments than I have in the past month!

I didn’t realize the stroke-to-path thing before doing the perspective effect would do that. I’ve usually created a thin path (no stroke) by various means to get the tapering. As usual, I’ve done something the hard/stupid way for quite a while before finding out there was a much easier/smarter way.

By: neon g

neon g — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:34:56 +0000

Thanks for the tutorial personally I’m a fiend for cornish pasties, I can’t help myself.

One tip I have when using the perspective tool is to do a “Stroke to Path” on all your lines beforehand. This makes sure the width of the line tapers into the distance rather than being uniform.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to play with Gnumeric …

By: Richard Querin

Richard Querin — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:34:10 +0000

@Jody – Thanks for the great tips. I realized that a lot of adjustments could be made in Gnumeric beforehand, but in the interests of time I thought I’d just give a brief overview of how to create the graph for those unfamiliar with Gnumeric and get right to the Inkscape stuff. No problem doing the screencast.. hopefully it also has the side benefit of making more people aware of Gnumeric too.

@Walther – Thanks. And while potato chips are okay (Ripples FTW), I’m an even bigger fan of Cheetohs. To each his own.

By: Walther

Walther — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:12:22 +0000

Great tutorial. The graph looks really great. Thanks

(And potato chips rule!)

By: Jody

Jody — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 18:45:07 +0000

A few points
1) You can drag the chart directly into inkscape, no need to save and reload.
2) Several of the simpler formatting changes (line widths and such) can be done directly in gnumeric.
3) no need to set the legend to ‘manual position’. Just dragging it in the preview will adjust it.
4) Thanks for doing this screen cast.

Best Wishes, Jody.

By: heathenx

heathenx — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 18:32:32 +0000

Oh…don’t even get me started on cereal.

By: rfquerin

rfquerin — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 17:51:07 +0000

Okay. I nominate that comment for Comment Of The Year!

First let me say that I had regrets about the ‘I’m a pig;’ Chart title. I really did. But it was the third attempt at recording it and I was getting frustrated. I honestly thought about putting “I Love Donuts” but that was after I had already typed the ‘I’m a Pig’ title. If I had deleted that and changed it I would have looked like a wuss.

All the other crap about the donuts (like the numbers and stuff) are actually factually true. I swear.

So donuts are your thing. My weakness is cereal. I used to be up to 3 bowls of Frosted Flakes before bed every night (no joke). We all have our problems.