Results in Image Trace CS6 don't match Live Trace CS3 [2012]

[Guest]

I just started using CS6, jumping from CS3. A major tool I use is Live Trace, and I have custom settings for that. I cannot find a way to make Image Trace behave the way Live Trace did for black and white line drawings. The results I get in CS6 are far inferior to those I got in CS3 in terms of retaining the look of the original raster image. Help would be greatly appreciated. Otherwise, I will have to leave CS3 installed just to do my Live Trace.

Here is a sample of what I mean. You can see the quality degredation in CS6 compared to CS3. (And it's much more obvious when it's full size and full resolution.)

My settings used in Live Trace (CS3) were:

The settings I tried in CS6 that gave the above result were:

Thanks for the help!

[Guest]

I can't even FIND where to do the manual settings for the live trace. I have been pulling my hair out with this!

[Monika Gause]

Which version?

[Guest]

I think I found it... it's just weird. CS 6. It isn't as friendly as the older ones.

Sent from my LG Mobile

[Guest]

I think that I found it. I'm using CS6 and it isn't as friendly as the older versions were.

Sent from my LG Mobile

[Karen Palsdottir]

Hi,

Thank god somebody else has this problem. I had CS3 on my last computer,  now that computer is dead and I got CS6 through school. Everything that I do depends on live tracing and I just can not...get the same results....

The way i used to live trace in CS3 was by using a photograph (.jpg) and live tracing it grayscale ...in about 20 layers

When I do the same in CS6 I just get horrible layer division and the image is very bulky.

Is there a solution this problem?

Ive been using my friends CS3 for awhile when I get the chance but now her computer is broken.
Is there eve a way to get your hands on CS3 anymore?  Ive tried to trace things manually in CS6, the only way I get close to detailed results is if i trace the image in like 180 layers.. and even then the quality is not at nice.
Please let me know.

Best,
Karen

[geoparkin]

Does anyone at Adobe take note of these user experiences? This thread goes back to August 2012 and the underlying issue has emphatically still not been addressed.

I recently subscribed to Creative Cloud services, which involved a leap from Illustrator CS3 to the latest version. Along with many others, I am heavily dependent on the Live Trace feature, for converting black and white bitmap line illustrations, and its current iteration, Image Trace, produces very significantly inferior results. I have been obliged to regularly revert to Illustrator CS3, which still runs – after a fashion – under the Mac El Capitan OS, solely for its Live Trace facility.

Is there any way Live Trace could be reinstated in the next Illustrator upgrade? It seems to be widely agreed that Image Trace has been a step backwards in terms of performance. Failing that, how about a standalone app based on the original Streamline, which did the job of bitmap-to-vector conversion as efficiently and accurately as any subsequent iteration.

I would love to see this problem sorted out.

Cheers,

Geo

[runninghead_design]

Just a me too post really but I've been a fan of livetrace for my lineart since CS3 and I'm running a whole other Mac just to be able to continue to use it's live trace facility!!
CHOICE has been lost in the new Image Trace offered by CC and this needs to be resolved. I know what I'm doing here re: resolution, settings, etc and all comparisons fail to achieve the same elegant and precise results offered by CS3.

[andyw94072450]

me too...

I've just upgraded to CC from CS3 and am regretting it.

I trace my line art and got great results in the earlier version but now after hours of playing I still can't get anything that comes close. The new trace is clunky and inaccurate with loads of artefacts and cropping.

I screen print and registration is key, the new CC version even offsets the trace which makes it useless to me... WHY?

I'm now on the lookout for a specialised tool for turning line art into vector art like CS3 used to.

Any ideas?

Andy Wilx

[Mermaidsdream]

I too would like to know why it offsets the trace? Is that a function of a preset that can be undone somehow? 

[Monika Gause]

  schrieb

I too would like to know why it offsets the trace? Is that a function of a preset that can be undone somehow? 

Can't be solved or prevented from happening.

[andyw94072450]

Can we have an answer please Adobe?

[Monika Gause]

andyw94072450 schrieb:

Can we have an answer please Adobe?

This is a user forum. The people here are 95% users answering questions of other users.

In case you want to try and improve your results please post examples. In case your want to post a feature request or bug, please do that here:

Feature Request/Bug Report Form

[runninghead_design]

If you have a problem with Adobe software, you're not going to head over to Feature Requests, you're going to come here.

If Adobe aren't monitoring these Forums and making notes with enough regularity to pick up the most common gripes then that is a serious issue. One that does not reflect well on Adobe.

We should continue to vent here, where at least our fellow professionals will empathise.

It's great that the community is so mutually supportive but, let's face it, Adobe have a habit of overlooking long-standing bugs.

We struggle with these multiple issues everyday, for years.

So, like a big company that makes you wait for half an hour in a call queue before you get to speak to a human- Adobe guarantees an annoyed attitude from it's customers right from the start.

Adobe take note, your customers are paying you to find and deal with the bugs.

They're assistance may be appreciated, but it should not to be expected.

I may add another drop to the feature request ocean, if I can find time later.

Or I may just come back here and vent, either way, Adobe should be listening- HERE.

[runninghead_design]

Wow! Never had a post rejected by moderators before!

Especially odd when it contained no swearing, was factually accurate and responded directly a previous comment in the thread.

I guess Adobe do listen here, and respond very quickly- in some circumstances.

Now I'm off to keep up on that thread on pesky drag handles (that started back in 2013).

Best of luck jkraft

btw: I just discovered Astute Graphics plugins, they seem to resolve a lot of our issues and enhance Illustrator in many excellent ways, though they ain't cheap!

[kenj63410513]

Yeah, I've been using Illustrator since 1995, to convert my finely-drawn line art to vectors.
But CS6 won't do it, and Adobe has made it clear enough that it doesn't care.

Fortunately, ADC has come out with a new version of Canvas for Mac, Canvas Draw, which has a great auto trace tool that works like Adobe's used to.

canvasgfx.com

Highly recommended!

[geoparkin]

Thanks for the heads-up on this development – very interesting. I'll check out Canvas Draw. I'm extremely worried that with some future Mac OS update, I'll lose the facility to run Illustrator CS3, which I still have to on a regular basis purely for the Live Trace feature.

I'm still convinced there would be an enthusiastic market for a standalone bitmap-to-vector auto-trace app similar to the old Streamline, if only there was a developer out there inclined to produce one!

[kenj63410513]

Most annoying of all to me is that Adobe won't let me run CS2 now that I have CS6, so I can't use the Adobe Illustrator autotrace tool that I paid for years ago.

Anyone know a work-around?

[Monika Gause]

kenj63410513 schrieb:

Most annoying of all to me is that Adobe won't let me run CS2 now that I have CS6,

That's complete nonsense.

If your operating system supports it you are allowed to run CS2 until your computer falls apart.

Problem is: in case you're on Mac OS, system version 10.6.8 is the last one that supports CS2.

[kenj63410513]

Of course it's not nonsense, it's exactly what's happening.
And it's happening on a computer that uses 10.6.8, which, as you say, supports CS2.

Here's what I get if I try to start CS2 even after I've "deactivated" CS6.

[Monika Gause]

You need to download the installer from here:

Download Adobe Acrobat 7 and Adobe Creative Suite 2 products

You also need to use the serial number from that page.

[kenj63410513]

Please explain why I need to reinstall CS2.

Also please explain why people should have to use CS2 to get the same quality of autotrace results that Illustrator used to give.

[Monika Gause]

You need to reinstall in order to get it to work with this serial number. Just do it or it won't work. Please research the topic of CS2. It has been documented all over the internet.

As for how live trace/Image trace work: it has been completely redesigned.

Most of the people here (and that includes me) are volunteers helping people in their spare time. We don't speak on behalf of Adobe and we can't explain why things happen. We can only sometimes tell you that they happen.

[kenj63410513]

Thank you.
And I'm sorry to see someone spending their time unpaid doing what Adobe can very well afford to pay someone to do.

Meanwhile would someone please explain why CS2 stops working after CS6 is installed, other than through Adobe's own fault?
I've done a search and, contrary to Monika's assertion, I've found nothing.
Thanks again.

[Monika Gause]

This has nothing to do with CS6.

Have you even read the page I linked above?

Adobe has disabled the activation server for CS2 products, including Acrobat 7, because of a technical issue. These products were released more than seven years ago and do not run on many modern operating systems; Adobe no longer supports them.

Because the activation server is no longer running they had to make available a special version to all registered users that can be used without the activation server.

I had CS6 running with CS2 side by side on the same computer for some months (if not years, I don't remember). And CS3, 4 and 5, CC were on the same machine as well.

Want a screenshot of that? There you are:

And yes, I actually used them.

[kenj63410513]

Thank you for clearing it up that it was an Adobe problem in general and not specifically a CS6 problem.

For people who are looking for Autotrace that works with fine line images like Adobe's Autotrace USED to work before CS6, besides Canvas Draw's excellent Autotrace, there's also a $5 program available through the Apple Store called Image Vectorizer that works excellently with fine B&W line drawings. The program works on System 10.8 or later

Image Vectorizer - bitmap to vector graphic conversion

it won't do layers or multiple colors but it does have all the fine adjustment tools one would want for converting B&W line art (like the kind I've been doing for over 30 years –http://www.penart.com).