Type With a Mask
Steve Weinrebe
www.ImagingRandR.comThis creative type effect in Photoshop, begins with the Type Mask tool, and then fills the text with the underlying layer by means of a Layer Mask. Layer Effects add the finishing touches, but the technique that makes this type effect really work is to clone the elements of the underlying layer to fill the type and the background, with rich imagery, in this case flowers.Unlike my "Photo Filled Type" tutorial where text becomes part of a photograph defined only by a drop shadow, this technique actually fills the type with an image, and what is around the type is up to you. Sometimes I'll lay type against a black or fully opaque colored background. In this case I let the background fade in, but when using layers and layer effects in Photoshop this is all very flexible and, in a word, non-destructive.
This technique works great with food, or anything that can be recognizable through the type. Since Spring is in full bloom, it seems appropriate to use flowers, so let's do just that.
Fill the image with flowers
What we want is an image chock full of something colorful that will be easily recognizable through the type we are going to create. That's a simple job using Photoshop Clone Stamp tool.
Step 1:
Open the image you want to use and clone the elements all over the image, including up to all the edges, using the Clone Stamp tool. Use a very large brush size, and clone elements to fill the image. With this photograph of flowers I first choose the clone stamp tool and Option-click (Mac), or Alt-click (Windows), to choose the source points from the center area of the flower cluster. Using the Clone Source palette I selected a second clone sources by selecting the second clone source button in the palette and Option/Alt-clicking again in my document to set that second source. Then I can switch back and forth between clone-source-1 and clone-source-2. This gives less of a pattern to the cloning and makes more a jumble of the elements, which is a good thing for our purposes.
Switching back and forth between the clone sources, and occasionally choosing new sample sources just to jumble up the flowers in the image I continue to paint using the Clone Stamp tool and a large brush. Tip: if you are blending an area with the Clone Stamp it can help to continually re-sample the source that you are cloning with.
This way I can end up with the below image, filled with flowers.
Add a Solid Color adjustment layer
Step 2:
Let's add a solid color, covering the entire image, that will surround the type we are going to create. From the Adjustment Layers drop-down menu in the Layers palette choose Solid Color, and the Color Picker will pop up.
For this image I chose a dark blue color.
Step 3:
Because I want to add type that will fit as much of the image as possible I want to work with a horizontal image. From the Image menu I'll choose Rotate Canvas.
Add a Type Mask to the layer mask
Step 4:
Now the image is prepped for the type. First make certain the new Solid Color adjustment layer is the active layer in the Layers palette, and then choose the Type Mask tool, which resides in the same slot as the traditional Type tool.
When creating type it is a good idea to use a large and bold font, possibly even all-caps. That way there will be plenty of area in the text for the underlying image to show through. From the Type Mask tool options I chose the font called Impact, and for a high res image a 90 point size (lower resolution images may need a much smaller font size). Note that I also chose centered justification.
The Type Mask tool works much like the traditional Type tool, except that it is not editable once committed. Not to worry, if you make a mistake remember it is just a selection, and you can choose Deselect from the Select menu and start over. For this project I'll type "FLOWERS FOR YOU", hitting the return key after the first two words.
Once the type is finished, click the check-mark in the Options bar, or press the Enter key on your numeric keypad.
Step 5:
To make the type "see through" we need to fill the selection with black, which will add black to the Solid Color adjustment layer's layer mask. Black, on a layer mask, hides that portion of the layer and we will be able to see through to the flowers in the layer below.
In the resulting Fill dialog, choose Black as the color, at 100% opacity, and Normal for the blend mode; click OK. The result is see-through text.
Size the type as needed
Step 5:
Let's transform the text so that it really fills the canvas. We can do that by first choosing Select All from the Select menu, to select the entire layer mask. (Note: you can select just the text, a couple of ways, but you might get artifacts along the edges from the transform not pulling in some of the anti-aliased pixels, so better to transform the entire layer as I've suggested.)
Then choose Free Transform from the Edit menu, and stretch out the transform bounding box so that the type fills the canvas, and click the check-mark in the Options bar, or double click within the bounding box, to make the transform.
The result, below, is ready for our next step, adding layer effects.
Add Layer Styles and Blending Options to give depth to the type
Step 6:
From the Layer Effects drop down menu at the bottom of the Layers palette you can choose a number of different effects. My preferred way of bringing up the Layer Style dialog is to double click at the right of the layer in the Layers palette, but you can just choose Drop Shadow for starters, and the Layer Style dialog will pop up. For this project I used 4 styles, Drop Shadow, Inner Shadow, Outer Glow, and Bevel and Emboss. I made some adjustments to each one, most notably the shadow styles, mostly to enlarge them a bit, but there is tremendous flexibility with each style so do what you think adds the best effect to the text. Lastly, to fade the Solid Color layer back a bit I lowered the Fill Opacity down to 60%, just for a subtle background around the type.
Below is the result of the layer styles applied to the Solid Color adjustment layer
Fading back the area around the type really wasn't necessary, and since the mask can be re-selected or duplicated we have a host of other options. For example you can use this as a template and drop any image below the Solod Color layer for the same effect. Also you drop another image below the Solld Color layer and then duplicate the Layer Mask, by Option (Mac), or Alt (Windows), - dragging the layer mask down to the other layer in the Layers palette. This creates a duplicate layer mask on that layer, for a result like the image below.
Steve Weinrebe:
Mode Studio
Photography © Steve Weinrebe, Getty Images
