June 2012 Tips and Tricks - Using Text as a Shape

[Barbara B]

June is blossoming with new tips and techniques! Get into the Mould tool and see how to lay text in perspective over photos to "write" your own novel! Gary shows you how in the June 2012 Tips and Tricks tutorial, Using Text As A Shape.

Study it here and then come and back and show us your shapes!

[angelize]

I didn't use a photo, instead I used a vector illustration that I already had from a project I did for a family photo album once. The font I used is Mayflower Antique (a Dieter Steffman font) that goes quite well with the book.

[Gare]

Hi Frances—

If no one is thrilled with the photograph of the blank book, let me offer a render. Click to expand the view of the jpeg, and then right-click to download it.




What I'm trying to demonstrate in this month's bonus tutorial is perspective, and as a secondary consideration, lighting. I'd like members to learn how to blend text into a scene, not simply add to existing content.

I try not to create easy tutorials. Not impossible or lengthy ones, either. But this one here will serve you well to learn when you need to add something photorealistic into a scene, in this case text and perhaps an illustration.

My Best,

Gary

[angelize]

Ok here is another try. I've used your render as I don't happen to have a blank book handy at the moment. I think this one is more in the spirit of the tutorial!

The spirit bear artwork to some improvising to get it looking right and I'm still not completely happy with it. This was a very complex vector drawing that takes time just to load never mind mold, so my solution was to create a bitmap copy at 300dpi and I used the perspective mold to get the perspective to match the page. However the image was too square, it didn't match the curve of the page. Unfortunately Xara's envelope molds don't mold bitmaps so I went to a tool that can warp them, the liquid colour filter. This was fiddly, as I had to do a series of edits kind of trial and error to get it to look right.

I wish the liquid filter had an option to show your page behind the image you are editing this would make doing this kind of thing much easier.

[Gare]

Much more to the spirit of the tutorial and a wonderful effort and example, Frances.

I didn't (and don't) recommend fooling with bitmaps when trying to conform a fake page to the angle and slope and curvature of a book page, for precisely the reason you encountered.

However, you could auto-trace bitmaps so the area to be Moulded is all vector, and as far as alignment goes, setting the group to partial transparency as you work, and then finally restoring opacity, lets you look under the design to the book area underneath.

I think it's quite an effect and have often used it in a composition. Here's one dating back to 1996:



I think modeling the book helped me envision the perspective needed to add text. If anyone uses a modeling program (such as Blender or Poser), I've attached the model I created to render the book. Pose it, render it, have fun with perspective and Xara's Mould tool!

My Best,

Gary

[angelize]

Thanks Gary, I've downloaded the 3D file and will take a look at it in Blender later. I tried the bitmap trace route with the spirit bear and I still wound up with a complex amount of shapes that was slow to mold. Perhaps if I had more time to play with the tracer settings I would have been able to get a better result.

[Gare]

This is slightly off-topic:

If you need to visualize something in Xara, in addition to just plain taking a photo and putting on a layer to trace over, there's also a useful, extremely simple-to-use site 3DTin.com. The management want you to register, but you can use a Facebook or Google account and get in and to work in about 30 seconds without supplying yet another site with personal info.

All I did was choose from some preset models and move, rotate and scale them. If this looks like it has potential as part of an illustration, to me, it's certainly an easy way to get a handle on drawing with perspective.



-gary

[angelize]

Well I had some fun with the book, thanks for sharing your model Gary. Because I needed to go into the node editor anyway to set the materials to display in blender I decided to create some new materials of my own to give the book a whole new look. I posed and lit the book on a different angle.

Here is an old book of quotes, and I have included my blank rendered image of Gary's book for anyone who would like to use it

[Gare]

I have another idea for this month's theme, perspective, if I get anyone who wants to learn this stuff in addition to Frances!

Would anyone like to learn how to put signage on the side of a commercial building, that was photographed at an angle (in perspective)?

—gare

[xtom]

Would anyone like to learn how to put signage on the side of a commercial building, that was photographed at an angle (in perspective)?

Yes please, I haven't had a chance to try out this tutorial yet but it looks good and I could do with learning more about how to use the mould tool effectively.