By: David Blatner
June 19 2007 • 9:04 PM
Sandwiching Text or Logos Inside an Image
Joe wrote:
I notice on every magazine out there — such as Maxim, Stuff, or any other major magazine — that the main title type of the mag is underneath the person. You can see a few letters of the title and the person is covering one or two letters. How is this done?
sandwich1
However, we’ve gotten permission from creativepro.com to reprint the article here in all its glory! Instead of copying and pasting it all, and losing all the formatting, we’re offering it here as a PDF download*, in the same format as the magazine. Enjoy!
click or right-click to download
(Note that this technique works in both CS2 and CS3.)
*You’ll need to expand the downloaded .zip file in order to read the PDF. InDesign Magazine recommends viewing the PDF with Acrobat Reader or Acrobat Professional (not Mac OS X Preview, or other pdf readers) because some features may not display properly in anything except Acrobat.
This is how I’ve always done this in a few mags I design. It’s actually nice to know I’ve been doing it “right.” However, I’m wondering if there are any other approaches, perhaps better, that other folks use?
I read another technique a while back. Basically you place the image down in a square box. Then you can, with the box active, draw with the pencil around the head, or any shape, and it will redraw the box to that shape. It is a little rough, but it works and you can tidy up the path/vector. It’s a nice little thing, especially if you just want to see if the effect works, without having to enter photoshop. I was looking for a selction tool in InDesign, but there isn’t any.
You could dupe the box and crop the box to the head, path around it, group the images and have the text slide between the two images.
Perhaps?
Eugene, that’s good thinking “outside the box,” but this has several problems. The main issue is that it’s a hard-edged clipping path. You could fake anti-aliasing with feathering, but it’s rarely good for anything other than a comp. If you didn’t own Photoshop, I suppose it might do in a pinch. But ultimately, it comes down to this: As soon as you want to do stuff at the pixel level, you want an image editor.
This idea of using the pencil tool got me thinking: You could use Paste Into to nest the text (or other vector logo) inside another frame. Then select the Pencil tool, click down on part of the outer frame, then drag along the shape you want to mask. Let go of the mouse button when the cursor is back on top of the frame again.
This works because the Pencil tool replaces portions of a frame when you start drawing over it.
But of course, it’s still a hard edge! So why did I bother? Because it’s fun to try.
>So why did I bother?
Because some images allow path edges and in those cases I prefer to have the image placed only once.
I find this technique especially valid when the image already has a (clipping) path saved in Photoshop you can use in connection with the Pathfinder to build the mask for the text / logo.
Guys, I wasn’t trying to suggest my way was better
, just a different approach for people that can’t pixel edit.
Of course, clipping paths is the correct way to perform this.
>Of course, clipping paths is the correct way to perform this.
Not with furry images, it isn’t. There David’s procedure to use two PSD layers is far better.
No problem, Eugene. The more ideas the better. However, just so I’m clear: the point of my article is that clipping paths are probably not the best way to create this effect. Using Photoshop’s native masking is much better because you get a soft antialiased edge between the pixels and the vector logo/type.
One problem with this technique, done without a clipping path, is that some imagesetters will have problems with the file. I used this technique over an Illustrator logo with a gradient in it. I hadn’t drawn a clipping path and when the file was ripped, the gradient rendered differently under the transparency compared to the logo outside the transparency area. Just my 2¢.
Dave, there is no doubt that ALL of the transparency effects (in this or any other program) requires some work on the part of the output provider to ensure high quality. But there is equally no doubt that you can get excellent quality, without the glitches you refer to. One of these days we’ll need to do a post or podcast on the Secrets of the Transparency Flattener!
I would love to know what the transparency flattner is all about!
On the other note, I’m not the best at wording my things, as you can see. I can pixel edit anything and photoshop, illustrate, design anything, ask me to explain it and I can’t get the words from my brain to the page. I don’t know why. I know how to do it, just not to explain it. So forgive me if my comments aren’t completely accurate.
On the output provider side of things for images like this I have noticed problems when supplying layered pdfs to digital output bureaus - shadows turning to solid black etc. The quickest and safest workaround is to save as PDF-X/1A files. This is a cmyk flattened pdf file which almost any output device should be able to handle. This comes from experience of getting files out on anything from Postscript Level 1 devices onwards.