Transparencies in bitmaps

[bhealy27]

I'm sure this has been asked a zillion and one times, but is there any way to take a bitmap in Xara, select a color that you'd like to make transparent (like let's say white) and have that color drop out so that the bitmap is totally transparent with respect to that color but all the rest show through?

I'd like to be able to develop something in Adobe Photoshop, bring it in as a bitmap in Xara and eliminate the white background so that the bimap acts more or less like a decal.


Thanks,

Brian

[bhealy27]

I'm sure this has been asked a zillion and one times, but is there any way to take a bitmap in Xara, select a color that you'd like to make transparent (like let's say white) and have that color drop out so that the bitmap is totally transparent with respect to that color but all the rest show through?

I'd like to be able to develop something in Adobe Photoshop, bring it in as a bitmap in Xara and eliminate the white background so that the bimap acts more or less like a decal.


Thanks,

Brian

[gwpriester]

Brian

If the background is white, you can apply a Flat Stained Glass transparency, 0% to the bitmap. Anything that is white will become invisible.

Unfortunately, so will any part of the image that is white.

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

Be It Early So Humble...

[Erik Heyninck]

do you want to make something in Photoshop and make the white background transparant in Xara? Why not do this in Photoshop?

If it involves a difficult selection like hair in the wind, then you'll have work enough to make a selection in Photoshop. So why flatten to a white background and then re-open it in Xara to make the white transparant?
So why not make a PNG with alpha transparancy in Photoshop and open that in Xara?
These are just questions, I never tried it out myself.

An easy selection is piece of cake in Xara.
Open the bitmap, give it a flat transparancy of some 50%, create a new layer and draw your outline. Then fill it so as to see whether it is perfect, copy to clipboard and delete layer, activate bitmap layer and undo transparancy, paste, put the shape perfectly on the bitmap and combine shapes> subtract (or intersect, I don't remember as I do it automatically.) Then you have your bitmap shape without background.

My idea

[wfcentral]

========================================
An easy selection is piece of cake in Xara.
Open the bitmap, give it a flat transparancy of some 50%, create a new layer and draw your outline. Then fill it so as to see whether it is perfect, copy to clipboard and delete layer, activate bitmap layer and undo transparancy, paste, put the shape perfectly on the bitmap and combine shapes> subtract (or intersect, I don't remember as I do it automatically.) Then you have your bitmap shape without background.
========================================

You don't have to copy to clipboard and delete layer... just select both objects and hit combine shapes - intersect (for the keyboard enthusiast... hold down ALT and hit R-C-I ... I always just remember R-adio C-ontrol and then A-dd S-ubtract I-ntersect

Later,
Robert

[gwpriester]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR> So why not make a PNG with alpha transparancy in Photoshop and open that in Xara?
These are just questions, I never tried it out myself. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Eric

I tried this before I posted my first answer. Unless I am missing something, I was unable to export a 32-bit PNG (Alpha channel) from Photoshop 5.5. And Photoshop's PSD export did not preserve the background transparency.

Gary

Gary Priester

Moderator Person

Be It Early So Humble...

[bhealy27]

Gary,

Erik's suggestion works fantastically in Photoshop 6.01 I just tried it. Opened a bitmap, created transparencies where I wantedthem, saved as a PNG file and imported to Xara. Came in clean as a whistle.

Thanks for the help.

Brian

[Erik Heyninck]

for reacting to my suggestions.

WFCentral: you made my life easier.

Gary: I'll try in PS5LE that came with my scanner.

If you don't work against time, time often works for you.

[\"W\"]

Brian,

As Gary mentioned, if the color you want to eliminate is white, all references of white will drop out of your image using "stainglass". However, if your "decal" is basic in shape, selecting it in Photoshop should take little time, and if you're going that route, save your selection as a channel first... before export (or save as). If the area you want to isolate has a border that's not uniform, like hair for example, there's a product called Corel Knockout that's supposed to be pretty good at masking. I never tried it. It's expensive for a product that does only masking, though. Another method you may also consider, is to simply node edit the bitmap in Xara by first breaking it apart then adding nodes etc.

I've attatched a sample here that points out the beauty of PNG. It's my understanding that PNG was to be the web format that provides true transparency to your graphics. It was to take the best of gif and Jpeg... and in a way, it does.

Unlike gif, PNG can provide 256 levels of transparency. Just feather your selection.

These steps outline Photoshop export. Photopainters need not save the selection first, export it as an active mask.

Cheers, Wayne

[Ross Macintosh]

Given this thread is discussing transparent png's I thought I'd add a link back to an earlier thread I started about the creative possibilities of transparent png's and xara's bevel tool which can actually be used to allow an object to have two fills at the same time! Amazing but true! Find that old thread here.

Regards, Ross

<a href=http://www.designstop.com/>DesignStop.Com</a>