How to create a transparency

J
Posted By
jln32
Feb 4, 2004
Views
371
Replies
9
Status
Closed
Hey Forum-

Please help!

I have an image (it’s a drawing from an AutoCAD file saved as a JPG) consisting of a black BG, which i want to get rid of, and a series of blue/gray/red pipes and connections.

My goal is to place the blue/red/gray pipes without a BG so that i can place it on a brochure that already has a background.

The only thing is the image does not have separate layers…so how do i get rid of the black BG and come out with just the colored pipes/connections?

I tried to export the image as a transparency and bring it into illustrator, but my image in illustrator is blank.

Any suggestions?

thanks in advance!
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SF
Scott_Falkner
Feb 4, 2004
If the image was rendered by AutoCAD hen he black is probably pretty consistent. Open the image (rasterize as TGA, not JPG) and double-click on the background layer to make it a maskable layer. magis wand on the black background: tolerance=8, antialiased, NOT contiguous. Press Delete. Save as a PSD and place that into Illustrator or InDesign.
J
jln32
Feb 4, 2004
scott-

i’m stuck….i saved it as a TGA file, but now i try to double-click on the BG; however, do i double-click on it WITH the magic wand? when i do that, it selects the image and not the BG.
SF
Scott_Falkner
Feb 4, 2004
Double-click on "background" in the layers palette to make it a layer.
SG
shecky_greene
Feb 4, 2004
I have an image (it’s a drawing from an AutoCAD file saved as a JPG)

By what means did you "save as" a JPG from AutoCad?
MV
Mathias_Vejerslev
Feb 5, 2004
You can also use the Magic Erasor straight on the black on the Background layer.
SG
shecky_greene
Feb 5, 2004
If you have Acrobat (not Adobe Reader) installed, the best and easiest way to get a good, print quality image with a transparent background. Is to "plot" the original AutoCad document use Acrobat Distiller. When you open the PDF created by this process you will be prompted to specify image dimension and PPI. The result be a single layer with a transparent background.

If you don’t have Acrobat you might try this useful utility. $45 for a single user/non-commercial license or $70 for business license. And there’s a fully function trial version if you only need to do this for your current project.

http://www.print-driver.com/howto/autocad_drawing.htm
RL
Robert_Levine
Feb 5, 2004
Can you save as EPS out of AutoCad?

Bob
RM
Rick Moore
Feb 5, 2004
You can Export out of AutoCAD to EPS. You can also plot to a PostScript printer and get an EPS file – this allows for more control over the output and you don’t need Distiller – the PostScript plotter drivers are part of AutoCAD and added thru the Add-A-Plotter wizard

Can you save as EPS out of AutoCad?
SG
shecky_greene
Feb 5, 2004
For some reason I’ve never been able to get great results exporting or plotting EPS files out of AutoCad 2002, but the plot to Acrobat Distiller works perfectly, for me.

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