Bringing in picture without background

[waynesworld]

I'm using Quark 4.04 on a Mac. This is both a Quark and Photoshop question (I'm using Photoshop 6.0).

In Quark, I've created a document with a background color. I want to bring in an image that I have created in Photoshop where I have cropped out elements, ending up with an image with a white background. In Quark, creating a picture box over the background (color: none), I have tried bringing in this image as a TIFF and as an EPS but the white background comes in with the image. I thought in an EPS format just the image comes in without the surrounding white background. Any answers on this?

Thanks,
waynesworld

 

[georgiaK]

This is the procedure:

A. If your photo is in RGB, CMYK or Greyscale mode -

1. In photoshop, make a path around your image and save it.
2. From the paths window choose Clipping Paths
3. At the clipping paths window, choose the path you made.
4. Save your picture as Photoshop EPS.

5. Place your picture in a picture box in your quark document.
6. Fill your background with the colour you prefer. The background colour will go around your picture.


B. If your photo is a bitmap -

1. In photoshop, make sure your picture is in bitmap mode and save it as TIFF.
2. Place your picture in a picture box in your quark document.
3. Fill your background with the colour you prefer. In the colours drop down menu you have three options. The middle one (a rectangle
with an X in it) shows that you can colour an 1-bit TIFF by choosing
any colour from your list.

 

[waynesworld]

georgiaK,
Thanks! Here's what happened when I tried it, as already suggested by Carlos in the Quark forum:


Thanks for your suggestion, Carlos. I tried it and it sort of worked. I did a clipping path in Photoshop and saved it with a Flatness value of 10 device pixels (it could be a flatness of anything from 0.2-100). Then when I saved it as an EPS, there were several Preview and Encoding options. I tried a preview of Macintosh 8 bits/pixel and an Encoding of ASCII. When I brought it into Quark, it basically worked--there was no white background. But the edges were jaggy and the image didn't feather smoothly into the Quark color blend background.

I ended up doing it in Photoshop by lassoing the photo image out of it's surroundings (using various feather settings), C &P it into a gradient background and it worked perfectly. Either I should have used one of the other settings when saving the path/EPS or there's no real way to get a perfect result other than doing it in Photoshop--a lot more work than I thought.
waynesworld

 

[Guest_imported]

I've come across this situation quite a few times in the print bureau where I work. Assuming you're working with a color image, any part of it can only be fully transparent or fully opaque. To get feathered edges, you should:

1. Find the background color you are using in Quark;
2. Make a Photoshop file whatever size you need;
3. Fill it with that color;
4. Put your image on a new layer, and use Photoshop tools allow the background to show through appropriately;
5. Flatten the image, save it, and bring it into Quark.

If you print this out on a non-Postscript printer, it'll still look bad, but hey, that's Quark. Also, watch out for color management systems. Sometimes they can interpret the same color in different applications as slightly different shades. If you're sending it out to be printed, make sure your printer is aware of this so they can compensate for it...

 

[waynesworld]

blue ark,

Thanks! That's what I ended up doing. There's probably a way to make it work with a Quark background, dropping out the Photoshop color image background with a smooth feathered edge clipping path but it's too complicated for me to worry about. So I just created a Photoshop background, feather-lassoed the image out of it's background and pasted/flattened it into the created backgound.

waynesworld