I have tried to do pen exercise from this tutorial, but somewhere along the way when it comes to recreating the curves I fail. Here is a picture with the exercises



How do you accomplish these type of curves

The key controls arent the same in Inkscape and Adobe (maybe even other) products.

Multiple curves: Do everything as said in tutorial but use Ctrl instead of Shift

Curves with corner points: Do everything as said in tutorial but use Shift instead of Alt

For some reason or another i keep getting shapes like this image.



what is it that i must be doing wrong?

If you only want clear curves without fill, select the object and edit its style; go to Object > Fill and Stroke...
You'll see a popup with settings for Fill and Stroke, choose the Fill tab and click on the first left button (X means no paint).
There are more ways to bring out that popup, there's a button on the top toolbar for it, or click on the Fill and Stroke boxes you see in the bottom left corner of the window.

If you want to draw curves without fill right away and not have to change it later;
1. select Pen tool
2. look in the top right corner of the window, you'll see Fill and Stroke boxes, click there and you'll get an option to set the default setting for drawing curves, you may have to set it from an existing object


Judging by your image I think you didn't quite follow the tutorial exactly. This is what I think you did:
1. the same as tutorial
2. the same as tutorial
3. the same as tutorial
4. drag to here, DON'T RELEASE
5. hold SHIFT
6. move handle upwards, RELEASE

Point 7 is like point 3 etc

16. drag to here, release AND CLICK RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON to finish


This is what the tutorial says you should do:
1. click and press here
2. drag to here, release
3. click and press here
4. drag to here, RELEASE but don't move pointer
5. press SHIFT and then press (left mouse button)
6. move upwards (still holding SHIFT) and RELEASE both Shift and mouse
7. same as 3.
etc
.
.
16. drag to here, release, right-click to finish

This is the result you should get from the second tutorial:

capnhud wrote:what is it that i must be doing wrong?

Quite simply, you're putting the handles in the wrong place I assume you didn't have any success with redrawing the eagle from one of your past topics? Are you having trouble understanding how handles work?

I assume you didn't have any success with redrawing the eagle from one of your past topics? Are you having trouble understanding how handles work?

That is the catch I was able to do that trace with no problem but for some reason, either I am releasing something to soon or holding it to long but I do not end up with symmetric curves as in the tutorial.

This is the result you should get from the second tutorial:

I did end up with that shape, but figured it was wrong since it did not look like the tutorial. I had assumed that I would end up with the exact same shape and I did not so I was becoming frustrated, because I was feeling like I could not follow instructions laid out in front me.

capnhud wrote:I did end up with that shape, but figured it was wrong since it did not look like the tutorial. I had assumed that I would end up with the exact same shape and I did not so I was becoming frustrated.

If you put the handles exactly where the tutorial illustrates where to put them you will indeed get the exact same shape.

If you follow this:
1. the same as tutorial
2. the same as tutorial
3. the same as tutorial
4. drag to here, DON'T RELEASE
5. hold SHIFT
6. move handle upwards, RELEASE

Point 7 is like point 3 etc

16. drag to here, release AND CLICK RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON to finish




If you follow this (like in tutorial):
1. click and press here
2. drag to here, release
3. click and press here
4. drag to here, RELEASE but don't move pointer
5. press SHIFT and then press (left mouse button)
6. move upwards (still holding SHIFT) and RELEASE both Shift and mouse
7. same as 3.
etc
.
.
16. drag to here, release, right-click to finish

Instead of tracing the image I was trying to do it freehand and ended up with the shape like I did. But after seeing your suggestions of basically tracing the image I did indeed acheive the same shape. Sometimes I do things the hard way instead of the obvious.