How To Save Transparent Background. This tutorial covers creating a transparent background in Photoshop, saving the files and placing them into InDesign as either a JPG with a Path and Clipping Path or TIF with Layer Mask
Video Tutorial Outline
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Welcome to PEN TOOL Photoshop. In this tutorial, I’ll cover what you do with the path and the
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different ways you would import that into InDesign. There are a few different options. We can
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save as a layer mask, we can save as a clipping path, or we can just leave it as a path. And I’ll go
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through all these three different options and how we go about saving that.
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So, I still have this file here open, with Path 1. The first step we’ll cover is saving it as a clipping path.
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Select the Path go here, select clipping path. Path 1. So, you’ll save this image to the desktop as a JPEG
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Hit save. Just going to save it as JPEG 9 that would be the lowest setting we would go to to retain some detail,
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and a JPEG will retain this path. So, hit okay. And that will save as a JPEG with the clipping path.
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So, the second option is I can just save it without a Clipping Path.
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So, just as a regular path. And then save that as not-
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-not a clipping path, just a regular path. Still as a JPEG. Save that to the desktop. The other way
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would be to command and then click on the path as a selection. So, under select, I can choose
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modify, feather. So give it a bit of a feather, two pixels. Then in the layers palette, click on add
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mask. See, now I have a mask. In this case, I need to save it. So, I’m using this shortcut here for
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save as. Command-shift-S. To the desktop. I can save it as a Photoshop file, or I can save it as a
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TIFF. Photoshop file would just save. There’s no options for Photoshop. With a TIFF, hit save. I
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normally embed the color profile. Complete different tutorial outside of this tutorial. But it’s
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always very good to embed a color profile for color consistency.
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So, I hit save. The options for a TIFF. You always want to include LZW compression.
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Obviously, I want to make save transparency is on. This is just telling you that some
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programs don’t support transparency.
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All the information about image pyramid and all that other detail, if you visit
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pentoolphotoshop.com, it goes into all the details about what these settings mean. So, I want a Mac
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and I want ZIP compression. So I want a small file. LZW and ZIP compression will
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make it a much smaller file. So, hit okay. The main one is save transparency. Without compression it’s going to
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make it a much larger file.
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So, I’ve got the three versions saved now, that’s the TIFF. And I click over to InDesign. I have a
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blank document open. So, I’m going to place the images into InDesign. So first, command-D.
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The first image I want to place is the transparent background. That’s the TIFF and it doesn’t have
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a clipping path activated. So you hit open. Click and drag. And you can see it’s cut out.
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Go to the menu, view, overprint preview. It’s a nice soft edge, exactly as you see it in Photoshop. The next
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image I’ll place will be the clipping path. So, you hit open. Place that image.
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So you can see, That’s the clipping path.
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Really sharp edge. Whereas the layer mask, really nice and soft feather.
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Sometimes a hard edge is fine, hard edge objects. But most people like a layer mask. The
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advantages and disadvantages are all listed on pentoolphotoshop.com. You might want the sharp
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look. And you can see up here if I’ve cut in too far.
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And check this one. It’s much more natural sort of look with the layer mask.
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The last option was to place in the image that does not have a clipping path and is a JPEG.
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Place this image, So, you can see, it’s not cut out. The purpose of this though, is you might want to partially
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poke out part of the image. So what I can do is duplicate this box. Copy/paste in place. So now, I have
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two like that. Now, go into object, clipping path options, Photoshop path. And now I can choose
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the actual Photoshop path. Hit okay. And now that path is applied. So when I go to the
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image below and move the box down so you can see the path is applied.
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And you can see the path come out of the box. So, this is also where you’ve got to be careful as
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to how far you come in. See how it notches in a little bit. If you know it’s a partial and partially
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breaking out of a box, that’s where you’ve got to be careful about how far you come in. Now,
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you can see it’s a really nice effect. And that’s how magazines partially break out the image. You
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can do it with a TIFF and a PSD file, it’s just a different process I won’t go into.
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You can move this box all the way around.
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Also in Photoshop, I talked about how you can put a feather on a Path in InDesign. I don’t recommend it. It’s
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not really the greatest option. Menu, object, effects, basic feather, preview. Then, you start to see
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the effect come in.
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Just play around with these settings. It really depends on the circumstance. So, that’s how to
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place the final path through layer mask, or path through clipping path, or just regular path, in
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InDesign. I will see you in the next tutorial.
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