Hi,

I'm trying to change a solid black logo I made to solid white, but everything I've tried has yielded a different problem. I've tried to find the answer in the manual, on this forum, and on the web, but I've had no luck. Also, I'm very new to Inkscape and GIMP and all that so I'm sure this is an easy fix but I can't for the life of me figure it out.

So I've tried several different ways to change this logo to white...
* Note: all files are in Google Drive: https://drive.google.com/open?id=15Mvyx ... C5sZV11rOm *
- I changed the untraced black image to white in GIMP (using a brush size larger than my image and the Lighten Only mode). Then I traced the new white image in Inkscape. I tried so many different settings that I can't remember which ones had which problems. However, the main little glitches I had were all these grey lines/splotches where it was supposed to be white, or all the lines became way thicker than the original black image. For the grey splotches see, see greylines.png (you might have to zoom in to see). In particular, the top of the left eye has a big grey line that I think is the result of a fuzzy line from using the brush tool on the black version (see top of left eye in blackbeforetrace.png). For the thick lines see toothick.png; it's particularly noticeable between the pupil and lower eyelid on the right eye.
- Tracing the black image in Inkscape using Edge Detection (see blackaftertrace.png and blackaftertrace.svg) then changing it to white in Inkscape using the bucket tool (only filled small areas); and by selecting the image and selecting from the swatch (which at most reduced the thickness of the lines as seen in reducedlines.png).
- Tracing the black image in Inkscape using Brightness Cutoff then changing it to white in Inkscape by selecting from the swatch, but this again resulted in lines that were thicker than the original black version (see toothickswatch.png).

I tried many, many other things as well but what I've described here is what got me closest to what I wanted. I feel like this should be pretty straightforward and I can't figure out why I'm having so much trouble. Can anyone please tell me what I'm doing wrong? Your help will be much appreciated!

Hi.
You have different options to get the job done. A simply color invert will work as autotracing the bitmap and set the fill color th white.
Check out the attached file please.

Need an external file hoster for 410kb file size:
https://framapic.org/XqOKXyyiBZnb/ctLtx5yyowHy?dl

Cheers
P.

Of all the images that you showed, I didn't find the original -- at least not by their titles. Can you either share the original, or point out which one is? With that, I can give you some steps to achieving the best possible results.

However, you must keep in mind that Inkscape's Trace Bitmap is not meant to accurately reproduce images. Since I don't have your original yet, I can't figure out what the problems you described are, or what caused them. But it might not be possible to get an identical white version of the image.

Although having said all that, (and keeping in mind that I'm not sure if I've seen the original) I did download blackaftertrace.svg. It doesn't look too bad to me. I don't see a gray line over either eye.

But I hesitate to give specific steps, without being able to experiment with the original myself. And by the way, at least in my experience, using Trace Bitmap almost always involves a lot of experimenting. So you're not alone with that!

And now, having said even more, it sounds like Polygon might have a good solution for you. I'm not familiar with those particular tools, but it sounds like some ideas worth trying!

Thanks for the replies, everyone!

@Polygon: That is something that I have not yet tried! I'm going to take a whack at it today. I'll let you know how it goes! Thank you!

@brynn: I tried uploading the original file when I first asked my question, but the file is 600 dpi (probably a little excessive, I know, haha) and my internet connection at the time was brutally slow, so I didn't. However, I'm at a better connection now so the original file is now in the Google Drive with the rest of the files. It's called original.tiff. I'm going to try Polygon's ideas today so my problem may be solved already, but feel free to play around with the file and throw out some other suggestions if you like. The more ideas I hear, the more I will learn about using Inkscape!

Yay!! Polygon’s colour invert idea worked!! I imported my traced black PNG image (blackaftertrace.png in Google Drive) into Inkscape, then selected Filters>Colour>Invert and checked “Lightness”. Success! I uploaded the result into Google Drive (white-final.png and white-final.svg) in case anyone wants to have a look.

Thank you both for taking the time to reply to my question! My headache is officially cured