How to get nice text into a JPEG ?

[shiphen]

Hi

I am having trouble getting nice looking text into a JPEG - even at zero compression.
Any suggestion?

Backgound my JPEG graphic HAS to be a JPEG for technical reasons, and it has to include 5 small images and some red text. The problem is that the red text is looking quite rough (and not pure red!). Any suggestions?

J

P.S. My workaround is painful - it is to save a GIF as well as a JPEG, and then to open in photoshop (v6) and cut the text out of the the GIF...

[handrawn]

jpeg does not do sharp edged red very well - in fact it does not really do sharp edges well at all - its a photograph format 'designed' for continuous color graduation

if it is acceptable a slight border in black round the text might help

as a matter of interest - are you then re-saving out of photoshop as a jpeg? - I would have thought that would degrade further...

[Rik]

What might help is if you go to the 'Options' tab when you export.
Move the slider to 100% and then export the image.

You will see that image1 is not very clear - saved at the normal 75% JPEG Quality
You will see that image2 is much better - saved at 100% JPEG Quality.

[shiphen]

1_images_and_red_text.xar4_images_and_text__into_photoshop.psd

No, I am saving my JPEG at 100% in Xara and the text is still horrible!

As a temporary fix as a workaround, I am:
1. importing both the JPEG and then the GIF into Photoshop and
2. cutting the text out of the GIF and pasting it into the JPEG and then
3. Saving the JPEG from photoshop (using "For Web" - at in this case only 80% quality) to disk
...and the combined results are WAY better than Xara can do.

It works, but SURELY there is a better way of doing this !

J

[handrawn]

use photoshop in the first place? - at least for the text, save messing around with the gif

have you tried converting the text to shapes before exporting from xara - that might help

[Soquili]

What are the technical reasons it MUST be a JPEG?

You could use a truecolor PNG if you need that color depth which will have a larger byte size of course. A PNG will not have the same effect on red that a JPG will have.

A JPG at 100% will still have compression applied to the image and the resultant JPG artifacts.

[mwenz]

Xara's JPG export does need altering in my opinion. At least when text at small point size is involved.

1.jpg is out of PhotoLine where I added text.
2.jpg is out of Xara with text added.

Aside from color shift, which one has crsiper text--even though I didn't do the text size precisely the same, the result in PL is much, much better.

Take care, Mike

[gwpriester]

You will be better off using JPEG for your photos but make the text separate and use 8-bit (256 colors) PNG.

Or, if you want everything as one image, then make the photos 256 colors PNG as well. You will be surprised how clean the images will look.

[tonylondon]

Could you simplify your method by creating the complete thing in Xara, then save as PSD. Reopen in Photoshop and save as jpg?

[shiphen]

What are the technical reasons it MUST be a JPEG?

Our website is using a hard-coded filename. And we dont want to incur the expense of getting our external developers to change the name for no good reason.

I accept the point about PNG possibly being better than JPEG but I still say that Xara has a problem! If photoshop can do the job with CLEARER text as well as more accurate colouring, why cant XARA raize its game?(!)

J