Re: doing graphics when you're not an artist

["Dick Margulis " <margulis -at- mail -dot- fiam -dot- net>]

Jennifer,

In a similar situation, I found that I could work with the CAD engineers (bring brownies) to get them to output the views I needed as PostScript files. You can then bring them into Illustrator and clean them up, add callouts, etc. 

Of course in my situation the CAD engineers were in the next room and I could stand behind them and point. You may not have access to them, in which case this solution may not work for you.

Dick

 "Jennifer O'Neill" wrote:

>We need to use more graphics in our manuals. The problem is that the
>technical artist already has too much work and there's no budget to get
>another. We need line drawings of hardware equipment to show how to assemble
>the parts. Myself and my colleague are used to modifying existing graphics
>(illustrator and coreldraw) but not drawing from scratch.
>
>I'm wondering how practical it is to take digital photos of the equipment
>and then use a software package to trace over the parts of the picture we
>want to use. I think Adobe Illustrrator lets you do such tracing but haven't
>tried. Any other software that could help us? How do others draw pictures
>when you're not an artist?


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