Hi Friends,
Here's a tutorial for making a feather using Live Path Effects (LPE) Stitch Sub-Paths. It's the longest and most involved tutorial I've made, and also the first I've converted to PDF. Please let me know if you find any errors, or have any other comments or suggestions.

I hope you find it helpful

I found it easy enough to follow! thanks, I'd been trying to figure out how to make feathers for awhile now. I'd like to see how others end up coloring it though. Here's my first one, fairly decent for a first try, but could be better.
thanks!
dee
well, I uploaded the file to imgh, got the tag, and this site won't let me paste it in or type it in, so not sure about uploading the feather, sorry.
trying as a regular upload here:

There it is, I see it.
Nice! Now did you add in some shading, or is that an optical illusion because of the close together parallel lines? Well anyway, it looks nice.

I think it's kind of fun, because even though I follow the same steps every time, the part where I create the first basic lines, and then tweak with the LPE, somehow I can't make the same feather twice. And making a gently curved one is proving to be more of a challenge than I thought. Someday I'm gonna try making a peacock feather

Here's how to insert an image into a message:
-- upload to a host, like imgh that you mentioned
-- open a new message or reply
-- click the "Img" button, just above the text field; this will put something like this -- {img}|{/img} -- in the text field, except I've substituted curly brackets (to prevent the editor from trying to actually insert an image when I submit); the cursor will automatically appear right in between the tags, exactly where you need to paste the URL of the image (that you got from the host)
-- so now you'll see this in the editor's text field (again you will actually see [square] brackets) -- {img}http://url-of-img.com{/img} -- to make sure it looks like you want, in the right place, etc., click Preview (right beside Submit), and the image should show up in the message preview; if it doesn't, it will be showing your faulty code; so just fix the code to look like I've shown...here, I'll make it blue...

You should be able to insert an image in all forums, but images as attachments are limited to certain forums. Oh, and also, if you'll look below the smilies, there's a short list of different features. All of mine say "ON". Well the first one, "BBCode is ON" -- "BBCode" is a text link, and if you follow it, you'll find instructions for using all the forum features. I don't know why they make it so hard to find.... Hey, I didn't realize this forum software is open source! I'm thinking it might be time for a feature request

Ah, it did let me upload a regular attachment, yay. The odd thing is that I've uploaded objects (pngs) before, I copied the tag info (from the upload site), but the attachment field of the post wouldn't let me actually type or paste the info in, how odd is that. maybe it was a temporary glitch. oh well, will try it again at some point.

I did play around with the feather shading. On this one, I duplicated the feather (minus the shank) and put the chrome texture filter on it, which basically blurred it, then stuck it under the original feather to look like shading. On another feather, (that I haven't uploaded), I drew the basic shape and added a gradient, but I like the textured filter one better! Then I made another feather that was skinnier, and I liked that one even better. Was trying to get an all white feather (like they used to use when dipping ink into an ink bottle), but haven't gotten that far. I really want to do a peacock feather too! love them, but that will take some time. I noticed that neither the fill nor the fill bucket work with this.
I learned a lot from this tut Brynn, understood that filter before, so thanks. It's always a good day when we can learn something new! thanks again. I'm eagerly awaiting your tut on how to make a peacock feather now, lol!
dee

Ah, it did let me upload a regular attachment, yay. The odd thing is that I've uploaded objects (pngs) before, I copied the tag info (from the upload site), but the attachment field of the post wouldn't let me actually type or paste the info in, how odd is that. maybe it was a temporary glitch. oh well, will try it again at some point.

No, no, you're not understanding. Do you mind if I PM you the instructions? It's hard to be concise in a forum, and still cover all the details.

I'm eagerly awaiting your tut on how to make a peacock feather now, lol!
dee

I hope you're not holding your breath

Here's the thinner feather I did, added a grayish fill on the lighter one.
dee

Nice!

thanks Brynn,
I was just glad to get the thing uploaded, lol. no problems tonight, thx for your help.
I can't figure out how to attempt a peacock feather though.
Also, this is the first time that I've ever used Stroke to Path, never could figure out what it's purpose is! now I know.
dee

I can't figure out how to attempt a peacock feather though

Well, I think the first thing, when creating the first 2 subpaths that represent the feather shaft and outer edge, is that the one representing the outer edge will have to have some curve, like a bump-out, at the end that will be the tip of the feather.. Because some peacock feathers at the tip are quite round. From my experience though, peacock feathers are not all alike, especially variations among peacock species. So I'll have to look at some photos, before I get started. Although regarding the "bump-out".....well I'm not sure, I'll just have to look at some photos. What I'm thinking is that the outline of the feather may NOT be a curvy as I recall -- I'm thinking it may be the way the feather is colored, that gives that curvy impression....you know that "eye" at the tip?

I can't figure out how to attempt a peacock feather though

Well, I think the first thing, when creating the first 2 subpaths that represent the feather shaft and outer edge, is that the one representing the outer edge will have to have some curve, like a bump-out, at the end that will be the tip of the feather.. Because some peacock feathers at the tip are quite round. From my experience though, peacock feathers are not all alike, especially variations among peacock species. So I'll have to look at some photos, before I get started. Although regarding the "bump-out".....well I'm not sure, I'll just have to look at some photos. What I'm thinking is that the outline of the feather may NOT be a curvy as I recall -- I'm thinking it may be the way the feather is colored, that gives that curvy impression....you know that "eye" at the tip?