Aaaaaah Vectors! What? What is all that moaning and groaning I hear? *LOL* Believe me, vectors iz your friend! A vector shape can be anything you want it to be....and truthfully, the best way to learn how to use those shapes is to NEED a particular shape for something you want to create with PSP.

Once you master the art of turning those little handles, you will find yourself using them all the time. They make wonderful, non-jaggy selections....just surround the shape with a selection tool rectangle, click in the middle of it and go to Selections > Save to Disc. Name your selection and that nice shape you created will be there for you to use for many other things.....just open a blank image form and "Load from Disc" your selection.

This tutorial could have been done by using selections for you to download, but you wouldn't have learned anything about vectors if I did that. I'd rather my tutorials be tools for learning how to create your own designs and shapes and making the graphic be truly your "own" work. Mind you, I have nothing against making tutorials with selections of others...it's fun to have a quick result that you can also decorate as your very own. The image in this one is just a fairly simple bunny shape, but it is "built" using vectors and there's not a huge amount of shaping you will need to do to each of the pieces. I still recommend Ron Lacy's site for more information on the use of vectors if you are having trouble with them. I'll try to do my best to show you what I did as we go along. That being said......on with the bunny!

This tutorial assumes you have a basic, working knowledge of Paint Shop Pro.
Made with PSP version 6.0

To get ready to build the bunny with vector shapes, first open a new image file, transparent background, 500 x 500 pixels in size. Now, set your foreground and background colors to contrasting colors. I used brown (#99856D) in the foreground and a light creamy color (#EEEDE0) for the background. To make the first shape, go to the Preset Shapes Tool and set it for:
Shape type: Ellipse
Style: Stroked and Filled
Line Width: 1
Antialias: checked
Create as Vector: checked


Now, for the bunny's head, make an ellipse shape close to the center and near the bottom of your image form. You may want to enlarge it some to be able to see what you are doing when you start to make it into a triangle shape with rounded corners. Go to the Vector Object Selection Tool and then click on Node Edit on the toolbox. You can leave the node (one of the four little squares you see around your ellipse) at the top alone, except you may need to pull the handles out or down a bit.
~~*whoops* Almost forgot to tell you! On these ellipses we are about to make, I didn't have to add any nodes. You can add more nodes very easily if you need them...just hold down the control key on your keyboard while you click on the vector line where you need a new node.~~
Move the nodes at the side out from where they are now and turn the top handle up and in
and turn the bottom handle out and down. Here's a screenshot of what I mean:

See, it's just a triangle with rounded corners! No need to "fiddle" too much with any of the control handles on these vector shapes. Always remember that handy-dandy *UNDO* function of PSP....*LOL*....use it if you mess up...I sure do! Once you are satisfied with your shape for the bunny's head, right click and "Quit Node Editing", then go to Layers > Convert to Raster. This becomes layer two...you can name it, if you choose.

On the Layer Pallette, go back and activate layer one....which actually has nothing on it right now....just transparent. You will draw your next ellipse for the "body" on this layer and convert it to a new raster layer after you finish it....which will automatically place it behind the bunny's head on your image form.

Create a new ellipse. Use the same settings for ALL of the ellipses...we will be making them just as we did the first one. Make this one a long kind of narrow ellipse. Begin to shape it like we did before, (go to Node Edit) but moving the side nodes closer together. You don't have to worry too much about the bottom of this ellipse...it just needs to be completely behind the head of the bunny. To check your progress on making the shapes just right click and "Quit Node Editing"...you can always go back to Node Edit again to do more shaping.

When you think you have the body shape the way you'd like it, go to Quit Node Editing > Layers > Convert to Raster.
Time to make some legs and feet for this bunny. Again, make layer one the active layer...the transparent layer. This will put the leg behind the body when we make another layer with it. Draw a tall ellipse just slightly under and to the right of the body. Not much shaping on this one when you go to Node Edit. The bottom of this leg will be covered by the hind foot, so it needs to come down to just above the bottom of the head of the bunny. As you can see, I have just rearranged one or two of the nodes to make the shape I needed.

This time, when you get it the way you want it, go to Quit Node Editing > Layers > Convert to Raster and now we will right click on the layer palette (on this active layer) and "Duplicate".....then go to Image > Mirror.....there you go....a second hind leg. Move it if it doesn't fall into place exactly where you want it.
Make layer three the active layer (you want to make the feet just behind the head and above the body and legs). Node Edit and begin to shape a new ellipse into a large foot. Something like this:

Now, Quit Node Editing > Convert to Raster > Duplicate the layer > Image > Mirror.
Make layer five (the one with the hind foot on it) the active layer and make a small foot similar to the shape you just made....it will become the front foot. Node Edit > Quit Node Editing > Convert to Raster > Duplicate > Image > Mirror. You will have to move this layer up on the layer palette to just above the Copy of Layer Five. The two front feet should be in front of the hind feet...at least that's what Mother Nature says. *LOL*

For his ears, make active the Copy of Layer Seven in your pallete and create another ellipse. Shape it into an ear with the Node Edit and keep doing what we did before to duplicate it for the other ear.

  

For the inner ear, change your background color to a nice pink (I used #E2AEC4) and shape that inner ellipse as shown above...just inside the ear you made first. Duplicate and put into place on the other side like we have been doing.

Activate the topmost layer and you can start to make facial features, but let's go to the next page to do that.

Page Two

tutorial and graphics © Auntie Em 2001