Photoshop - How to create outline fonts with more control...

[NDC]

Here's a trick I've been using for years to take more control over the outline texts. As you know, when you apply outlines using the stroke feature, it tends to bring an undesirable effect when you apply bevel and emboss or anything of the sort since both the font and the outline is effected. It's better to make a seperate layer for the font outline.

Here is my method making a font outline where I'm able to apply effects to the outline without effecting the appearance of the font itself.

1. Open a new document (CTRL+N)

2. Type anything you wish.

3. Go to Select\Load Selection and then press OK and you should have a selection around the font you just typed.

4. Go to Select\Modify\Expand\ and type in a value of about 3 and press OK

5. Now press CTRL+SHIFT+N and press OK to create a new layer.

6. Now get a big paintbrush and paint it the color you want the outline to appear.

7. After you have finished painting the outline layer, just drag the text layer on top of the outline layer you just created.

8. Now you can apply effects to the outline layer without making changes to the actual font itself.



And here is the difference. You cannot create the same effect as you see on the second type or the third on the first type since the outline is actually a stroke added to the font itself therefor giving you less control of how you want you font to appear!

Keep in mind that this method can be used in various ways to make images look more attractive as well. This method isn't used just for text types... ;)

[cyclone2]

Not to shabby NDC :D
Good tip :bunny:

[NDC]

Thanks! :)

Actually, this was a little tutorial I posted in a different site, but decided to copy it on over to my XPC...

[cyclone2]

Saw it there afterwards :)

[Socal]

*thumbs up*

Good stuff, NDC. ;)

[OuTpaTienT]

What are ya doing NDC? Giving away all the secrets? :D j/k

That's good advice to get a nice clean outline. http://www.xtremepccentral.com/forums/images/icons/icon14.gif

Only thing I would maybe do different is instead of using a large paint brush to fill in the selection I'd just do EDIT / FILL. This way there's no chance of you missing a pixel here or there with the paint brush. (I only know this to be a headache because I've done it. Doh!!! If I just used the fill command instead of a brush it wouldn't have been a problem.)

I've learned the same thing as you about putting your outline on a separate layer, however I tend to use a slightly different version of your technique here. I sometimes like to use semi-transparent text so the underlying image can be seen. But often if you do that to text that has no outline then it quickly becomes difficult to read. So what I do is instead of filling the slightly expanded selection on it's own layer, I'll simply Stroke that selection on it's own layer. When doing this you want the Stroke to follow the CENTER of the selection border. If you use INSIDE then your outline will be hidden under any opaque text, and if you use OUTSIDE then you end up with minute gaps between the text and the outline which is very unattractive. So use CENTER and just make it double however many pixels you want the outline to be.

This technique allows for transparent or semi-transparent text without losing readability. And on opaque text it produces the same clean outline at you're talking about here.


(click to see images at full size w/no jpg compression)
http://out.home.attbi.com/ndctext.jpg (http://out.home.attbi.com/text.html)

[Socal]

Most outstanding. I now have occasion for the tips in this thread and will practice for memory recall in the future.

Thanks, fellas ;)