Ink stains, ink smears, and pawprints

[SashaHoneypalm]

I'm working on a fanfic with visual elements, and I'm trying to replicate the effects of writing with a quill pen in the same room as a small kitten. How do I best put the "ink" in Inkscape?

Thank you,
Sasha

[brynn]

Welcome to the forum!

I'm not quite sure what "writing with a quill pen in the same room as a small kitten" means or implies.  Possibly something about the kitten playing with the pen while it's trying to write?

By writing with a quill pen, do you mean something like calligraphy?  Inkscape has a Calligraphy tool that will do that.

If you mean drawing the kitten playing, you'll have to dive into Inkscape and learn on your own.  That would be too much to try and explain in a message.

I would suggest starting with Help menu > Tutorials > Basic, Shapes, and Advanced (don't worry, "advanced" is a poor choice for the title of an introductory tutorial, so it's not really advanced - it's really the introduction to the most essential vector elements).

After that you could move on to 3rd party tutorials.  On the Home tab of this website is a listing of hundreds of tutorials, organized by skill level and a few other ways.  And there's also the manual in the Help menu, if you want to learn the hows and whys.

[SashaHoneypalm]

I'm not quite sure what "writing with a quill pen in the same room as a small kitten" means or implies.  Possibly something about the kitten playing with the pen while it's trying to write?

Sorry, I wasn't clear enough. That, yes. Ink stains, ink smears, and the occasional pawprint.

My kitten is bad enough trying to "help" with just a keyboard, I imagine if I was using an actual feather to write with, my handwriting would look like I was having an epileptic fit. And she'd probably knock over the inkwell, too.

[brynn]

No it was my misunderstanding.  I don't always notice what the message titles say, and all the info was in the title.

I guess you could use the Ellipse tool to draw ink spots.  And you could do the same thing for stains, except for lighter gray, or other color.  And maybe a little blur.  And there's probably a filter or 2 which would make the spots look like paw prints, you know, with some texture.  Maybe Filters menu > Distort > Chalk and Sponge, or well, there are so many that might work, you can just try them yourself.  Just be sure not to apply 2 filters to the same object.

Actually there's a webpage somewhere, that shows what all the filters look like.  If I can find it....  Ok here it is:  http://www.newthinktank.com/2013/12/inkscape-filter-effects/.  There are probably even more filters now, than when that was made.

(Actually, we really should have something like that on the Inkscape website....  A nice project for someone....)

[SashaHoneypalm]

That's a pretty helpful link, I might have to bookmark it.

[Lazur]

About the built in filters:

-There IS an all-in svg with examples shipped with inkscape.
Located at inkscape\share\examples\filters.svg.
May needs some updates but in general those filters would also need some refreshing.
-Made a collection earlier with each filter group in the menu.
Since they are so many, it may help with an organised look:
0.92 filter presets
-For a blot filter, made this one recently.
Comes also with a paper texture filter, so everything is at hand/paw.
-Don't mind if I also share this collection of custom svg filters.

Off-Topic: show

Free to use -hence under the radar-.

[brynn]

Oh, I had forgotten you did that.  I remembered you made the examples for all of the filters you made, but I forgot that you had made examples for all of them.

If you put an example of all the built in filters on one page, how big would it be?  I might ask the website people if it could be made into a page on the website, if it's not too big, if there's some restriction for size (I don't know).  Or maybe it could be a series of pages? 

I think I'll look into it.  I mean, you have them on OCA, so they're pretty much up for grabs (so to speak).  Oh, or maybe a custom gallery would be better than webpages?  The only thing is....  Hhmm, well for me, they would be more effective on a white background, rather than checkboard.  But maybe there could be both versions.  Ok, it's on my to-do list.

Maybe I should get around to adding custom filters to the Resources page (Home tab)?

(Sorry for going off topic, Sasha.  Just post again when you're ready, and we'll be back on topic.)

[SashaHoneypalm]

About the built in filters:

-There IS an all-in svg with examples shipped with inkscape.
Located at inkscape\share\examples\filters.svg.
May needs some updates but in general those filters would also need some refreshing.
-Made a collection earlier with each filter group in the menu.
Since they are so many, it may help with an organised look:
0.92 filter presets
-For a blot filter, made this one recently.
Comes also with a paper texture filter, so everything is at hand/paw.
-Don't mind if I also share this collection of custom svg filters.

Off-Topic: show

Free to use -hence under the radar-.

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but how do I download a vector? I'm clicking the download link, but in some places it's not showing up in my files and other places it says I can't open it in Inkscape.

[brynn]

To use one of those filters, you need to right-click on the Download button, and choose Save Link As or Save Target As (depending on which Windows system you're using).  You need to save it in a special location, which is:

C:/Users/yourname/AppData/Roaming/Inkscape/filters

where "yourname" is the name of your account on your computer.  Usually people use their name for the account, but really any text can be used.  So whatever it is, only you know.

AppData might be hidden.  If you can't find it, let me know and I can tell you how to unhide it.  (Or maybe someone else can, in case I'm not around.)

If Inkscape was open when you did that, you need to close all the instances of Inkscape you might have had open.  When you open Inkscape again, you'll see the new filter.  I'm not sure how Lazur has it set up.  But the last filters of his which I installed, they show up under a new category called "Personal".

[Lazur]

If you put an example of all the built in filters on one page, how big would it be?

This big.
In my humble opinion that image speaks how cluttered the whole filter section is.
There is no preview, the categories are hard to track, names don't provide a decent description and hardly any of those filters give the desired look.

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but how do I download a vector?

By clicking on the thumbnail the browsers are directed to the svg file. There is a chance your browser is not showing the svg as in general filters are resource-heavy.
The right clicking thumbnail image-save link as option can work, as well as clicking the red "download" button.

Then you should receive a local copy in your downloads folder by default.


To use a filter I usually open the svg image containing the filter, applying the desired filter on an object with the filter editor or just selecting an already filtered object, copy it (Ctrl+C) and paste it into a new document (Ctrl+V).

After that, the new document will have the filter definition and it can be added to any object.
Just select the object, and tick in the box next to the custom filter in the filter editor.

There is some windows bug/feature though that makes it necessary to close the filter editor before switching between the two running inkscape instances.

[SashaHoneypalm]

To use one of those filters, you need to right-click on the Download button, and choose Save Link As or Save Target As (depending on which Windows system you're using).  You need to save it in a special location, which is:

C:/Users/yourname/AppData/Roaming/Inkscape/filters

where "yourname" is the name of your account on your computer.  Usually people use their name for the account, but really any text can be used.  So whatever it is, only you know.

AppData might be hidden.  If you can't find it, let me know and I can tell you how to unhide it.  (Or maybe someone else can, in case I'm not around.)

If Inkscape was open when you did that, you need to close all the instances of Inkscape you might have had open.  When you open Inkscape again, you'll see the new filter.  I'm not sure how Lazur has it set up.  But the last filters of his which I installed, they show up under a new category called "Personal".

That's weird. I don't have Save Link As or Save Target As. Just have Open Containing Folder, Go To Download Page, and Copy Download Link, none of which lets me save it as anything.

[Lazur]

Below is a direct link to that blot filtered svg:

https://openclipart.org/download/315751/1550880299.svg.

You should be able to right click/save link as 1550880299.svg.

[SashaHoneypalm]

All right, now I have a paper texture and a rectangle that says REJECTED, on a blue background. No dots, though.

[brynn]

That's weird. I don't have Save Link As or Save Target As. Just have Open Containing Folder, Go To Download Page, and Copy Download Link, none of which lets me save it as anything.

Let's make sure we're both talking about the same thing.  Because Lazur gave links to a couple of different sites.  What page are you on?

[Lazur]

All right, now I have a paper texture and a rectangle that says REJECTED, on a blue background. No dots, though.

That word rejected has the blot filter. Copy and paste it into your drawing.
Open the filter editor from the filter menu Filters/Filter Editor...
Select the object you want to be filtered and tick in the box next to the filter, called "blot transparent 3".
(In the original file there were 3 blot filters which decreased the transparency of the original object a bit and 3 that only displaced the image.)

[brynn]

Just so you're not too confused, Lazur and I are giving you 2 different ways to get to the filter.  Whatever works best for you, is the best way

[SashaHoneypalm]

I really hope I'm not testing your patience, and if this is getting too annoying I'm willing to just shut up. But: C:/Users/[mynamehere]/AppData/Roaming/Inkscape/filters is not a valid file name, at least according to my cranky computer.

(On the bright side, I managed to download a nice ink splatter set without undue complications. So as soon as I get the paw prints downloaded and ink smears figured out, I'm all set).

(Also, the bait-and-switch "free clipart vectors- but that one and that one and that one are premium" thing that a bunch of those websites have is pissing me off).

[brynn]

Oh, no worries.  I have tons of patience!

C:/Users/[mynamehere]/AppData/Roaming/Inkscape/filters is not a valid file name, at least according to my cranky computer.

No, it's not a file name.  It's a folder.  Or maybe it's a filepath.  If you used that to search, by copying it, I probably didn't type it right.  I think they're supposed to be backslashes instead of forward slashes.  Or possibly AppData is hidden and that caused the error message?  Did you try to browse there, or just search it?

(Also, the bait-and-switch "free clipart vectors- but that one and that one and that one are premium" thing that a bunch of those websites have is pissing me off).

Yah, you gotta watch those sites.  I don't think Open ClipArt does that.  That's where Lazur uploads all his work.  They have a huge database, although personally I find it hard to locate professional-looking art.

[Lazur]

(Also, the bait-and-switch "free clipart vectors- but that one and that one and that one are premium" thing that a bunch of those websites have is pissing me off).

If you have a user profile at openclipart you won't even see any ads -so it's even better than deviantart.
Also the bait sites mirror alot uploads from openclipart.

[Moini]

To be more concrete, it's a folder name, and you need to create the folder if it doesn't exist yet (which is most probably the case).

[SashaHoneypalm]

Thank you for your help, y'all! I'm not going to be winning any graphic design awards or anything, but I think it came out pretty decent.

[brynn]

It looks good to me too.