Drawing a Butterfly

#1-take my clear gif
http://nquale.com/sigs/clear.gif
to Image Magick

#2 -Resize--200x200

#3 -Draw--
Upper left wing

Primitive: bezier
Coords: 100,150 140,70 30,10 20,25 10,0 40,40 30,70 20,90 10,95 20,100 55,120 100,150
Fill color:none
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1

#4 -Draw--
Upper right wing

Primitive: bezier
Coords: 100,150 190,100 200,40 190,30 170,40 105,75 100,150
Fill color:none
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1

#5 -Draw--
Lower left wing

Primitive: bezier
Coords: 100,150 10,100 15,130 20,220 25,215 100,150
Fill color:none
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1

#6 -Draw--
Lower right wing

Primitive: bezier
Coords: 100,150 130,130 145,170 110,250 100,150
Fill color:none
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1

#7 -Draw--
Butterfly body

Primitive: ellipse
Coords: 127,210 5,25 0,360
Fill color:black
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1
skew x: -10 skew y:-30

#8 -Draw--
Left antenna

Primitive: bezier
Coords: 108,108 110,50 100,20 90,60 90,50
Fill color:none
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1

#9 -Draw--
Right antenna

Primitive: bezier
Coords: 109,108 110,50 140,40 110,60 140,50 141,60
Fill color:none
Stroke color:black
Stroke width: 1

#10 -Paint --
color:replace
fuzz:9999
color:whatever color you want.



My plans were to play around with the Bezier primitive until I understood it...well after playing with it I found I was not even close to understanding it so I`ve decided to explain what I can and leave it at that.

First I`ll explain what coords are,a coord is a set of 2 numbers,the first number desinates how many pixels from the left side you want your drawing to be at and the second number desinates how many pixels from the top you want your drawing at.

Bezier is a combination of a polyline (a straight line) and arc`s (curved lines),Belzier lines will curve on there own between 2 points.It`s the only Draw function that lets you curve lines in whatever direction you want which means you can free hand draw things.

You must use atleast 3 sets of coords,a beginning coord,a center coord and an ending coord but I found that you really need quite a few more coords to get the lines to do what you want them too and even then it`s sorta a guessing game because the lines will not go to the exact coords that you put in the parameter box,I`ll explain that more later,but first I`ll explain the coords in step #3 which is the top left wing of the butterfly.

100,150 is 100 pixels in from the left side and 150 pixels down from the top.As you can see we seperate the one set of coords with a comma and we use an empty space to seperate the next set of coords
140,70 is 140 in from the left and 70 from the top.
30,10 is 30 in from the left and 10 from the top.
20,25 is 20 in from the left and 25 from the top.
10,0 is 10 in from the left and 0 from the top.
40,40 is 40 in from the left and 40 from the top.
30,70 is 30 in from the left and 70 from the top.
20,90 is 20 from the left and 90 from the top.
10,95 is 10 from the left and 95 from the top.
20,100 is 20 from the left and 100 from the top.
55,120 is 55 from the left and 120 from the top.
100,150 is the last set of coords which matches the first set of coords because we want to end the butterfly wing at the same point that we started it at.

Now you probably noticed especially with the 10,0 coord that there`s no part of that upper left wing that comes close to being only 10 pixels from the left and 0 pixels from the top--that`s one of the peculiarities of Belzier,it tends to "shrink" inwards towards the center.

I made this example using alot less coords then the above to show how the lines pull inwards towards the center.I used a 200x200 gif to do the drawing but then I resized it to 400x400 so that you could see the coords better.



I used step #3 for the above graphic only I used these coords-
100,100 100,40 0,0 0,20 100,200 100,100
As you can see the 0,0 coord is no where near the top of the square and the 0,20 coord is off but the one that`s really way off from where it should be is the coord.The 100 should put the line in the center of the square and the 200 coord should put the line at the bottom of the square so basically bezier has a mind of it`s own.Even after saying that you can still use the coords that you think will put the lines in the correct places to see where the lines will actually show up and then just back out and change the coords until you get them where you want them.

To get the feel of what Bezier does with coords why don`t you take the coords from Step #3 and place only 100,150 140,70 30,10 in the coord box and click draw and see where the line is,then Back out of that page and add 20,25 10,0 40,40 to the coord box and click draw and check where the line is,then back out and repeat with the rest of the coords.By doing the above it`ll sorta give you a feel of how the Belzier function pulls your coords inwards.You could also try changing the coord numbers to see what happens.


There`s also another peculiarity to bezier,if you want an upwards curve to your line you must use one negative number in the coords where you want the line to curve,like this 5,-10.You can also use 2 or more sets of coords for the curve and have one negative number in each set,like this 5,-10 10,-20 20,-30 but you can`t use 2 negative numbers within one set of coords or else it won`t work,like this -5,-5.



In the above graphic I used the coords of-
100,150 150,100 5,-5 100,30


Besides Bezier the other Draw function you use for this butterfly is ellipse for the body of the butterfly.Ellipse requires 3 set of numbers,the first set of numbers is the ellipses location on the square,127 from the left side and 210 from the top.The 2nd set of numbers is the width and height,5,25 and the last set of numbers is the start and end of the ellipse using degrees, 0,360




To make the above graphic I took a 200x200 clear graphic and used the paint function to find the coords I wanted.To do that just leave all of the paint settings as they are,then click onto the gif and put the paint arrow up in the upper right corner and click onto it.On the next page the first 2 numbers under the graphics were my coords 195,10.
The first number is how far from the left your arrow was and the second number is how far from the top your arrow was.
I then click a quarter of the way down close to the left side and got the coords 15,45
Next I clicked a little further down on the left side and got the coords 15,60
Next I click 3/4 of the way down on the right side and got the coords of 185,135
I then clicked a little further down on the right side and got the coords 185,155
Lastly I clicked close to the bottom left corner and got the coords 10,185

I then clicked onto Draw and used the settings in #3 and placed my coords from the above clickings into the coord box
195,10 15,45 15,60 185,135 185,155 10,185
and then I clicked draw.

The reason for this 2nd example is just to show you that by clicking onto a graphic and getting the coords you could draw pretty much anything.You just have to remember that the bezier function shrinks the coords inwards so it may take a little work to draw something exactly where you want it and in the shape you want it but with some practice you should be able to draw any shape you want by using bezier along with some of the other Draw functions.Bezier is just the most flexible of all of the Draw functions.