Tracing artwork

There may be times when you want to base a new drawing on an existing piece of artwork. For example, you may want to create a graphic based on a pencil sketch drawn on paper or on an image saved in another graphics program. In either case, you can bring the image into Illustrator and trace over it. You can create a layer to use especially as a template.

You can trace artwork in the following ways, depending on the source of the artwork to trace and how you want to trace it:

• Use the auto trace tool (ICON) to trace automatically any image you bring into Illustrator.
• Place any EPS, PDF, or image file into an Illustrator file as a template layer and manually trace over it using the pen or pencil tool. (See Changing the display of layered artwork.)

Related Subtopics:

Tracing with the auto trace tool
Setting the auto trace gap distance