Removing text

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I was asked about editing the graphic on The Kitchen Planners Home Page. In particular, the owner wants to replace the white text on the picture with something else. Is there any graphics software available that might be able to seamlessly “restore” the colour beneath the white lettering?

Alan

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Sure — the Clone tool in any good graphics program should be able to duplicate small enough areas of the background to allow you to seamlessly draw over the text without any problems. Since this probably is a .jpg image, the Clone tool or the Healing Brush in Photoshop should do it easily. Paint Shop Pro has similar tools, as does PhotoImpact. You might want to download Photoshop Elements Trial Version, a fully-functioning 30-day trial of the full program.

Added later: Oops, sorry Alan — Photoshop Elements 4.0 will not run on Windows 98. It may finally be the time to take the plunge into XP. If you can locate a copy of Photoshop Elements 2.0, it will run on 98. There probably are quite a few copies left in the stores.

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I found PhotoFiltre, which has a magic wand selection tool and a clone stamp. I’m afraid I have no idea of how to use either though. I can (roughly) select white text letters, but have no clue beyond that. Any ideas?

Alan

BTW, the “plunge into XP” has been “on” for about the last year.

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Hi Alan,
In PhotoFiltre with the graphic opened and the Clone Tool selected, move your crosshairs over to an area just above one of the white letters, hold CTRL key down and left click – this will set your ‘clone from’ point. Now release the CTRL key and left click over the top part of the white letter (immediately below the clone from poinit). You should be able to figure out some logistics to finish off the rest of the letters – my guess would be to re-select the clone from point for each change in background tone..
HTH
Bob (the other one)

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Hi (other) Bob

So easy when you know how! It seems to be pretty simple and effective on first play… even for a paint dummy like me. I’ll have some further practice and see what sort of masterpiece I can come up with. Thanks for the instruction.

Alan

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Ahhh, another Rembrandt is born

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Hi Alan

With that type of work it is best to use something like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro that has a full complement of tools at its disposal. In Photoshop most of the work can be done using a combination of the patch and clone tools, but it would also require other tools to complete the task. Here is a version I experimented with, the most difficult area to work with being the word kitchen on the yellow background due to the way the underlying colours change.

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Hi Tony

That’s just what the doctor (friend) ordered I think. Do you mind if I lift your handiwork, to show him the kind of result he could expect?

I suspect he’ll also want to add some new text, probably anti-aliased, like on the original. Would the kind of software you (and Liberty) mentioned be the most appropriate for this as well?

cheers
Alan

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Hi Alan

Feel free to use the image. Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro both include anti-aliasing options for text.

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Tony

Alan

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Just a small, after the event comment if I may.

I use Macromedia Fireworks for my graphic stuff. In FW it saves the file as a PNG file by default which I keep to one side as my master copy of a graphic. You will note that J Bear has recently got a new hat for crimble. I went back to my master copy of him make my changes and then export the image as a gif file.

The beauty of saving it in the FW png format is that it creates layers for the background, extra imported images and text objects. If I need to make drastic changes to the finally exported gif image I just return to the png file, make my changes and then re-export.

I am aware that the original developer of the site may have this and it does not get you out of this problem, but it may be a good technique to remember for next time. My worth

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Thanks Jezza. That sounds like a good strategy. I didn’t know that the PNG format had layer support, or is this a feature of MMFW? Regardless, I do have a copy of PSP (v6 I think) which also supports layers. I must get round to installing it, and will certainly bear your method in mind.

Priority at the moment, and I’m sure you concur, is getting the hats seasonally adjusted!

Alan

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I agree, hats are the first priority.

As for working with layers, at one point whilst experimenting with removing the text I had 8 layers in the file. Once you start working with layers you wonder how you ever got by without them.

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Me too, me too! (although mine is an actual photo and not an edited graphic…)

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However much I hate beards, I think you can get away with this one for a few weeks Santa Mark

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Thanks, Jerry! That’s simply dashing…

I should probably grow one for real. Although I doubt I’ll be able to have it by this Christmas. And I think my girlfriend would tell me to get lost… but otherwise, it’s a great idea!

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PSP 6 should work fine for you, although the interface is a bit strange! The bad news is that Paint Shop Pro 6 was considered quite buggy. If you’d like to try Photoshop Elements 1.0 on your 98 machine (as opposed to a quirky PSP 6), I have two copies, and can set you up with one of them. It runs fine under Win98. Of course, the best thing you could do would be to locate a copy of Photoshop 7.0, but that’s fairly expensive, and may be more program than you need at the present.

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On further checking, it appears that my free PSP is only version 5. As I said, XP is on the agenda any day now so it may be worth considering something more appropriate.

Alan

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