I'm trying my first Inkscape project, and I'd like to make a semblence of a 45 RPM record. I wonder how many people here, besides me, have seen one!

The answer may be in the HTML manual, or the tutorials, but I haven't been able to find it. At this point, there's a lot of terms used with Inkscape I'm unfamiliar with. At the same time, when I read some of the Inkscape instructions, I find I'm familiar with the effect, but just know it by a different name.

So... Here's what I'm trying to do:

I'm going to guess, actually assume, most have seen a vector graphic of a record, and the creator has made a couple "wedge" shaped areas that are white, presumably to represent an area of reflected light.

I'd like to do similar, but have it be a gradient fill, rather than a separate section.

I'll try to write an alternate description of what I'm trying to do.

Think of the disk as a compass, with the zero degree heading at the top, and the degrees increasing in a clockwise manner. Starting at 270 degrees (I'd use the degree sign, if it can be done and I knew how to do it, and I'm using a Mac), I'd like the record to be 100% black, and continue to be 100% black to approximately 300 degrees. Then, as you continue to rotate around the center, have a gradient fill progress to white until you get to about 330 degrees, and stay white until you reach zero degrees. And then reverse the fill around to the 90 degree position. The actual degrees listed are for illustration, and are subject to change depending on how it looks.

Sort of like a series of rays (lines) that change their shading as the rotate around the center.

Does that make sense?

Can it be done?

No. What you are describing is a conical or sweep gradient. Inkscape does not support this style of gradient. From your description you may be able to approximate this effect with a blur or an interpolation since for the first 300 degrees of sweep you don't want any change.

Thanks, druban.

I was afraid it wouldn't. But at least I know what to call the effect!

This isn't answering your question, but I did a 45 a while back. Very fun project.

Oh nice work, Kjohrf!
Looks just like mine -- the real thing, not any image I've drawn
( giving away my age, I guess)
Am I imagining smudges, or did you draw in a couple? Or maybe it's a fingerprint on the label? Wow!

Anyway snowshed, getting back to your questions, I just have a couple of comments. If your image is fairly small, you could probably "fake it", and get the impression of such a gradient. But if it's full size, while you could still "fake it", you'll probably never get it quite right. Another thought, make the "white wedge" area fairly narrow, and it might not be noticable that it's a linear gradient (rather than conical). OR, make the original sized white wedge area mostly solid, with only a small portion of it using a linear gradient, rather than all of it gradient (almost the same as my previous comment). And one more trick I've used for faking it -- depending on the size, I'd use 2 or 3 linear gradients (identical except for the direction of the gradient) and line them up to approximate the conical gradient. Especially if one end is fully opaque, as you describe, it will help to disguise the fact that they're not all one gradient. Then if you Blur the gradients, it helps to disguise even more. Also you could add a duplicate wedge on top, remove the gradient, and make it something between 0 and 1% opaque white (over 99% transparent). I've found that working on black or very dark colors, I can use this almost like a blur, but don't have the issue where part of the blur extends outside the border.

Like I said, you'll probably never get it quite right. But if faking it is an option, just some thoughts

Kjohrf's record is great!!!! I've been studying it, and I think I've figured out how he/she did a lot of the work. It's made me consider other options for the design.

I'm going to track down a photo of a 45, and print it out oversized for measuring. Not for an actual measurement, but to make sure all propotions are correct. And if you think that's anal, you're absolutely right. That's probably one of the reasons none of the aircraft I've ever worked on have crashed, thankfully.

There's no way I can fake it, unfortunately. It will end up on a 16" X 32" banner so I suspect the cheats will show right up.

I'm not a graphic artist by trade, and until now the newest vector software I had was Corel Draw 4 for Windows. I only got into this because I answered a help request on Craigslist. If anyone is curious how I got from Craigslist to here, send me a private message I explain it. That discussion would not be germane to my question.

brynn wrote:Oh nice work, Kjohrf!
Looks just like mine -- the real thing, not any image I've drawn
( giving away my age, I guess)
Am I imagining smudges, or did you draw in a couple? Or maybe it's a fingerprint on the label? Wow!

Thanks. Yeah, I have a few of these (the real 45's) possibly including this one. Haven't checked
in a while.

Yes, that's an intentional smudge. Everything in the image was done vector in Inkscape. No
imported bitmaps. I didn't spend a lot of time on the spiral, so it's the rough part.