Patent ID: 6549205
Filing Date: 2003-04-15
Classification: G06T

Abstract:
A method of drawing shapes, comprising:(1) a first step in which, in order to trace, with BÃ©zier curves, a contour of a first one of first and second keyframes stored in a memory on a computer, digitized as digital data and made consecutive to produce an animation, a BÃ©zier curve between first and second vertices on the contour of said first keyframe is drawn when said second vertex is designated by use of a pointing device after said first vertex is designated, and above process is repeated between respective adjacent vertices on the contour of said first keyframe to thereby trace the contour of said first keyframe with BÃ©zier curves; (2) a second step in which said BÃ©zier curves obtained by tracing the contour of said first keyframe are displayed on a display so that said BÃ©zier curves are superimposed on said second keyframe; and (3) a third step in which, in a condition that said BÃ©zier curves and said second keyframe are displayed on said display so that said BÃ©zier curves are superimposed on said second keyframe, when a reshaping operation is performed manually by dragging said vertex by said pointing device in order to trace the contour of said second keyframe, and in the case where the position of each of vertices of said BÃ©zier curves is judged to be anticoincident with the cursor position indicating the current position of said pointing device on said display while the button of said pointing device is pushed, a first train of points nearest to points on a locus of the cursor in a period between push and release of a button of said pointing device and darker than a predetermined threshold of brightness among a plurality of points constituting the contour of said second keyframe, and BÃ©zier curves are calculated on the basis of said train of first points to regard said BÃ©zier curves as a line drawing for tracing said second keyframe.