Another good method Gary, thank you !
Printable View
Here's one way I've used:
Created by having two clones of a wood photograph
The Text WOOD is overlaid, sized as required, the with it and the top wood photo Arrange/ Combine/Shapes / Subtract shapes
The background image then has a Stained Glass transparency applied
Then with a copy of the text WOOD overlaid in position & cloned, moved down and right, Arrange/ Combine/Shapes / Subtract shapes, given a white transparency.
Ditto repeat but move one copy up and left. Arrange/ Combine/Shapes / Subtract shapes and given a black transparency
Another method I use is to use shadows:
Top:
With WOOD cut out of the photo, apply a glow shadow
Middle:
With a white drop shadow applied
Cloned change direction of the drop shadow and change shadow colour to white
Bottom:
Same but the colours of the drop shadows switched.
I tend to find that the difference between EMBOSS and ENGRAVE is purely the shadow location and it's visual effect. This is a 50 step blend on each - VERY quick example - I'm sure it can be made better, but it was just a quick example.
Attachment 131101
I thought I'd have a try.
Attachment 131106
I had losing definition so i tried to keep text as text here.
I have two displaced copies of each line with no fill.
I used CSS to add back the Fill with a transparency; Xara would change this all to an image.
There is a shadow I tried as well. To remove it rename htmlclass="shadow text-gradient" as just htmlclass="text-gradient".
You will see these in Preview.
Attachment 131108
You can type and replace any of the text and you can move the text around and it will recarve all over again - virtual wood etching.
Attachment 131107
Acorn
You guys are brilliant artists, thank you Egg, Keith & Acorn for so many methods!