

Vector Magic - Convert bitmap to vector - ctingom
http://vectormagic.com

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gizmo
Looks really nice. I don't understand why you need to have a monthly
subscription for this, who wants to trace bitmaps every month!? A system where
you get, say, 30 conversions for $10, or a license for a single day for $10
seems like a much more interesting deal.

This is the kind of service I would pay for in a heartbeat, because tracing
manually is a major pain. But a subscription? No way.

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mct
The bottom of the pricing page (<https://vectormagic.com/pricing>) mentions
that you can purchase "tokens", where 1 token == 1 image. You need to sign up
for an account to view a token pricing list, which is annoying, but
fortunately that's as easy as providing them with an email address -- there
isn't even an email verification hoop to jump through.

5 tokens is $14.05 ($2.81/image), 10 tokens is $26.65 ($2.67/image), and 20
tokens is $48.60 ($2.43/image).

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tptacek
I do a fair bit of Illustrator work, but the vector autotracing stuff always
feels like cheating, so I never use it. I'd be unlikely to use this.

Having said that, I love what this says about the software industry. That you
can do a tool like this as a web service, charge for it, and use the web as a
vector to take on a massively entrenched competitor --- a great sign. There
must be thousands of businesses just like this, waiting to be started.

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jacobolus
The last couple of versions of Illustrator have finally been allowed to use
the tech from Adobe Streamline (the legal requirement that it remain a
separate product expired), and are substantially better than they were before.

Lots of design shops reportedly kept running old hardware w/ Mac OS 9 as
dedicated Streamline machines for years.

Try Illustrator’s tracing out sometime. It’s pretty useful/fun.

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uriel
How does the code in new Illustrator versions compare with Vector Magic?

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Batsu
Ever the skeptic, I uploaded one of the Windows sample images (Water
lilies.jpg) and it spit out... a pretty damn amazing representation of the
image. Hats off to the creators, if this project fails it most certainly isn't
a quality issue.

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rabidsnail
Is this any better than POTrace(<http://potrace.sourceforge.net/>)?

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IsaacSchlueter
According to the site you linked:

    
    
        Vector Magic: A commercial tracing tool that
        is available through a web interface, for a
        fee. Unlike Potrace, Vector Magic works for
        color images.
    

So, I guess the benefits are:

    
    
        * It works in color
        * You get to pay for it, so you know it's Serious Business.

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rbranson
It would be easy enough to use ImageMagick to quantize the image to a limited
color palette, create individual images for each color, trace them using
POTrace, and then combine them back together. That's not to say that there
wouldn't be an infinite amount of tweaking, but I've basically implemented
this before.

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skoob
Inkscape does just that. It allows you to run multiple scans with potrace,
which gives you a separate path for each colour. Couldn't be more simple.

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eelco
Just for fun, I tried it with the examples from the comparison on the website,
but even with a lot of tweaking I didn't manage to get an image as sharp as
they claim to get. I don't think Vector Magic uses potrace ;)

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larryrubin
I won a copy of this at a recent industry event biz card drawing, but am
mostly working with code these days. If you want my copy (legal), get in
touch. -larry rubin

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bockris
I would love this. (And I actually have a use for it.) Post your email addy in
your profile or check my profile and email me.

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chaosmachine
Works well. Better than Illustrator's trace feature, at least for the subject
I was using. You only get 2 conversions before you have to pay, though.

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youngian
It's a pretty slick service - the best part is that it's very user-friendly,
which means you get very nice results without reading a bunch of arcane
documentation that expects you to understand the math (yes you, Inkscape).
Sadly, what started as a cool "look what we made" project from college kids
has spun into a paid service.

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e1ven
What's sad about it being a paid service? It seems like they're adding a lot
of value in ease-of-use.

My only objection is I can't see how much the token-based version costs
without signing up ;)

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sil3ntmac
I've used this for a while - it used to be free, I think it was hosted by some
university. I would upload logos and stuff on there and then download the svg
and scale them to my likings. It does work very very well.

Edit: it used to run only on a cluster of servers, the client-side program is
new I think.

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rigwit
Windows or Mac only? Hmm.

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teilo
Which, for nearly every graphic arts shop on the planet, is not a problem.

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nailer
But for most startup servers who'd like to use it via an API, is.

