Copying from an email – text only no background

Copy the text you want, then use PS type tool, select the font/size/color and paste into your image with that. this will create a type layer on a transparent background that can be altered in all kinds of ways. I’m not sure what you mean by watermark, though.

TLL

hi TLL …thank you. What does the PS type tool look like or is it under ‘tools’…sorry, like i said i’m not very good at this..

You need to read the Help files and/or the PDF manual, explore every menu, palette and optional UI button in the application, and have a cruise through Google, Tracy.

With as much gentleness as I care to muster, you need to understand that these forums aren’t so much a place for giving rudimentary instruction—there are a bazillion independently created Photoshop-specific sites for that—but more of a place users can come to when they get stuck with specific aspects of using the application.

In other words, you need to do some of your own self-directed homework, so you at least have a foundational understanding of what tools are available and what they do.

Well said Phos! It’s too bad that CS3 doesn’t come with the nice soft cover documentation books like the past versions came with. I was told by Adobe live chat that if I ordered off-line I’d get that. But after our IT dept ordered the CS3 EE upgrade from somewhere – no book, just a DVD. I like having the book to grab and have open next to me, and really miss it with CS3EE…

Good Luck Tracy

TLL

I have been known to use the manual for bed-time reading. But I suppose, considering the proportion of users that never crack the thing open, Adobe is doing its bit to preserve the forests.

I fully agree, TLL and J.J.…

I was immeasurably educated by purchasing and reading Deke McClelland’s Photoshop Bible when I bought my first version of PS for my own home use, May of 1997. It was a brilliant additional resource to the Help Files and PDF manual, which I also read thoroughly.

I had Deke’s book open on my desk or in my lap whenever I was exploring and using Photoshop. When I wasn’t at the computer, the book went to the bathroom with me, to bed, to work, to the breakfast, lunch and dinner table; on long car rides; in doctor’s office waiting rooms… everywhere. It was a constant companion for almost a full year.

It was worth it.

Some of us are apparently old enough to remember when literacy was useful.

i am a total novice so please specify path

Here are a few paths to choose from in order of descending free-ness:

<http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html>

<http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=414>

<http://www.totaltraining.com/prod/adobe/photoshop.asp>

I’m just relating what worked best for me.

I supplemented free-range experimentation and reading by visiting the best tutorial sites I could find and practicing techniques. If someone asked a tough question on one of the forums associated with the tutorial sites, I’d go figure out how to do what they were asking after, and then come back and write up as clear an explanation as I could, often accompanied by screen shots. Doing that taught me a lot of things I might never have explored.

I only started visiting here when I had enough confidence to answer questions.

And the wisest students understand that the learning NEVER stops. That’s a big part of the fun.

🙂

I’m just relating

I wasn’t being critical of literacy. I was just musing that book popularity is fading, along with the peaceful times one can find to sit down with one.

I liked the ‘Photoshop Wow’ book series as it offered random quick tutorials that sparked enough curiosity to explore the program more, with or without a bible or ‘classroom in a book’.

"I wasn’t being critical of literacy."

Oh, I got that much. Believe me, you’re not alone in wondering where the hell all the readers went to.

The CIAB series—for all their reference value—are some bloody dry reading.

Deke excels as a writer, and there are others who can make the learning process much more enjoyable through their more casual, conversational style.

do read… only i choose to read books that interest me.. photoshop does not rule my life..unlike some it would seem.. i notice that you’ve spent as much time critising as you would have spent simply offering some help (which is the point of these forums after all..isn’t it) maybe a forum designed for ‘ranters’ would be more appropriate for you rather than a site where people like me who need help, rather then made to feel inadequate. The company i work for have photoshop, they don’t have books available to me and i’m trying to self improve… understandably turning to Adobe’s help forums! thanks for your understanding and may i suggest you spend more time having some fun, rather than locked up in a toilet with a boring book, for believe me the last few additions to my request for help, makes for some very boring reading

Tracy, with all due respect, you are the one ranting. We are just offering ideas for ways you can learn Photoshop.

If your company expect you to use Photoshop they should provide training (or at least books).

Tracy…

You’re a self-admitted newbie who seems to want to learn. I’m trying to explain what worked really well for me.

When I started learning Photoshop all those years ago when I was in my late 30’s, it DID rule my life, thank-you-very-much. I was happy to find something so new, so absorbing and interesting. In for a penny, in for a pound…my singular dedication paid off, like it has for many of the regulars here who provide help, voluntarily, and for free.

The ultimate goal of teaching is not only to provide recipes of fact, but to guide the student toward self-sufficiency. If you don’t care to consider that part of the equation I contend that you’re not holding up your side of the bargain. When you ask a question so basic as:"What does the PS type tool look like or is it under ‘tools’…"—an answer that could be found in less than 2 minutes by searching the first chapter of the Photoshop help files—I can’t help feeling that you prefer to have your information handed to you, and that you seem to expect your knowledge to come with as little of your own effort as possible. If that’s the case, then, perhaps you would be better off Googling for tutorials and finding those independent websites that are dedicated to spoon feeding newbies like you the most elementary of concepts. They were a great help to me and many others early on, and that’s why I recommended them.

There’s nothing wrong with being a newbie; we’re all in the same boat when we first start out at any pursuit. But being lazy, holding an expectation of charity, and acting indignantly when a learning path is pointed out to you is probably not the best way to endear yourself to those who are in a strong position to help.

Sometimes when you look a gift horse in the mouth you’re gonna get bitten.

Nicely Said!

rather than a site where people like me who need help,

what about those of us who like to GIVE help? (as everyone responding in this thread has tried to do). this is a user to user forum, not customer support or adobe training. you pay cash money for those.

those of us who help out more than occasionally learn as much as we teach (well, i do anyway, still after all these years. today i learned a bit about edge masking – thanks mat!). so no, it’s not EXCLUSIVELY a place for people who NEED help. it’s a big world. imagine that.

Tracy, Sometimes it’s the terminology that you’re unfamiliar with that makes the process difficult to understand, but the process itself is actually easy to accomplish.

The menu that appeared on the left side of your screen that holds your working tools is called a toolbox. The 8th icon down, on the right side, is the letter "T." That is your text tool. Click on it to activate it.

Go to the text within your e-mail, highlight it and copy it to your internal clipboard. (I’m assuming you know how to highlight text, and then Ctrl C will put it on the clipboard.) Now move into Photoshop and open a new blank document, set your preferences for your new document, being sure "background contents" is set for "Transparent," so you’ll have a transparent background. Click OK.

Your new document will open, as will a layers palette on the right side of your screen. Your layers palette will show this new layer you’ve just created. (If your new layer is titled background, double click it and change the name to whatever you want.) If the palette doesn’t open, go to the top tool bar and click Window/Layers (F7).

Now, on the lower edge of your layers palette, there are two squares overlaying each other. Clicking on it will add another layer to your palette. Drag this new layer below your first. Add a layer color to this new layer, so you can see your text above it, once you’ve written it. Layer/New Fill Layer/Solid Color (pick medium gray).

From your tool bar (I identified that for you when we began.) Click on letter "T" to activate it. This is your text tool. Move your cursor into your document (on the transparent layer), click, then paste your text (from the internal clip board where you stored it earlier) by clicking Crtl V.

Although this moves your text into your freshly made document, it won’t carry the original formatting. You’ll need to format it manually. Your Font style and pitch (sizing) controls, located in the top tool bar, will only appear when the "T" text tool is activated.

If you hold you cursor down and move it across the page forming a box, before you add the text, your text will be constrained within the box. Adjust the box size by dragging the corner boxes.

You wouldn’t normally need this many layers, as the text layer automatically creates its own layer, but I wanted you to see the mechanics of making and moving layers around. Clicking on the eyes (at the side of each layer) will deactivate that layer (turn that layer off), and it will not appear in your document.

I suggest you go to youtube.com and watch the videos by Photoshop Mama <http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=photoshopmama> Watch them all (even if you don’t think you’re interested in doing what she’s doing, as it will teach you techniques you can use in other ways) over and over until you can duplicate the techniques!

You can open your Photoshop and run the video at the same time, stopping when you need to, or backing up to see it again; all while you’re trying the technique yourself. You will learn fundamentals that will help you understand what’s happening in Photoshop. Be sure to watch the watercolor videos, I think that’s the one she shows how to make a watermark.

I have never come across a "boring" book about Photoshop.

Possibly it was hard for me to comprehend, but never boring.

Q

Dear C AM

Please accept a huge thank you from me, I fully appreciate all your help and your understanding that sometimes things don’t come easy to people, for reasons only known to them. Through panic of losing respectability in my job and ‘no time’ to gain a understanding of a very complex item of software, that I have previously had zero exposure to (but still expected to deliver on) I truly ‘needed’ someone like you to instruct me through the process. I am in your debt…thank you.