Episode 080
Episode 080 – Drawing a Light Switch
by Richard Querin
In this episode I create a pseudo-realistic looking lightswitch using Inkscape v0.46.
There are a few valuable tips in this episode including the use of path and node snapping, gradients, creating slotted screwheads, and a couple of other things which could be useful on lots of other projects.
This probably is my longest episode to date. This is partly because I had a separate small idea that didn’t merit it’s own episode and yet wasn’t useful enough for a microsode, so I stuck it in at the end. If you want to see what it was you can either watch through to the end or skip ahead to about the 26min mark if you find yourself falling asleep 
.
Also, I’d like to thank Heathenx (and his previous episode) for allowing me to finally break out of the closet and show my true musical tastes. Thanks buddy! 
Tags: gradients, lightswitch, snapping, switch
January 19th, 2009 at 9:40 am
LOL @ musical tastes — looking fw to seeing this episode…
My first reaction to seeing the preview picture above was: http://briancarl.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/jesus.bmp I’m a sick man…
cheers
January 19th, 2009 at 9:54 am
Oh Zombiebrainz.. you just know you’re going to get in trouble for that one.
January 19th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
HeathenX is thanking HeathenX? Sounds like Richard is doing the screencast to me.
Cheers
January 19th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Excellent screencast. I’m rather fond of vector art of real-life objects such as this.
Oh…superb choice of intro song.
January 19th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
@Jaws – I have no idea what you’re talking about.. I mean if you’ll just refresh the page you’ll see that you were mistaken…
January 19th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
While the kid might be hot tonight.. time is a cruel cruel mistress:
http://rfquerin.org/temp/crueltime.png
January 19th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Wow. Cool tutorial. Some might say why draw a light switch? The subject isn\’t important, it\’s the techniques used to reach the conclusion which are excellent for a novice like me. Also getting my daughter to view your screencasts. Keep up the good work.
January 19th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Anyone got trouble with with this video and flash? For me the flash video eats up all my RAM! There’s a serious leak in flash for Ubuntu or something!
January 19th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
@Daverix
Seems to be working fine for me. I’m running Ubuntu Intrepid with Flash 10.0r15 in FF 3.0.5. The video seems to chew up about 35% of my CPU when streaming.
January 19th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
@ Richard
uh-huh…
January 19th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
RQ,
Very nice,
Ditto amheuwr
January 20th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
@heathenx do you run 64bit or 32bit? I’m running 64bit. Anyways, downloaded the avi-file instead! Maybe it’s time to test the 64bit flash beta for the next video?
January 20th, 2009 at 4:06 pm
@Daverix
I’m running 32bit.
January 21st, 2009 at 6:01 pm
Another Master Class
I am glad you mentioned the bit about duplicating for a new Number there by isolating the gradient effect…
That was an error I made frequently which that was melting my head… resolved
p.s. Do the tea cup and saucer please…
January 23rd, 2009 at 7:59 pm
Great screencast!
Richard I love your window theme, which one is that?
January 23rd, 2009 at 10:06 pm
cloddo,
Glad you liked it. The theme is called Shiki Colors I think. I posted about it along with the GDM login theme and an icon theme to go with it as well over on the linux outlaws podcast forum. The link to the post is: http://bit.ly/OtTM
Let me know if you need any other info on it.
January 24th, 2009 at 7:19 am
Thanks a lot! It’s awesome!
April 27th, 2009 at 9:24 pm
The paper glider is simply great!
I played with your idea a bit and created an animated version of a glider doing a loop. The key to covering up for a quick and dirty set of poorly laid out frames in the animation is to use a drop shadow that draws the viewer’s attention at least as much as the glider does.
Thanks for the excellent tutorials.
April 27th, 2009 at 9:26 pm
The animation may be viewed at:
http://jbrgfx.blogspot.com/2009/04/gif-animation-of-svg-paper-glider.html