Making an Image Transparent

Photoshop Image Prep for Non-Geometric Outlines

First we'll prep your image in Photoshop, then tak it into Illustrator and auto-generate a form-fitting border.


BEFORE YOU START— make sure that:

-Your image must be a transparent PNG. There can be no background, or the software will not be able to trace the outline.

---> if it is Not a PNG, don't worry; we will be fixing it either way. But this will significantly reduce the prep time.

-Ensure there are no stray pixels, artifacting, etc! It will ruin the outline, and thus the cut. We’ll touch on this more later.


If you need a PNG to demo on, click this link


Instruction video covering the whole process.

Includes timestamps for:

-removing background

-border control (both options)

-Illustrator formatting


Prepping Your Image

Here, we'll make sure your PNG is cleaned up and ready for Illustrator. this step requires a Photo Editing Software such as Photoshop (available in your adobe suite), or another such program that can edit PNGs.

File Setup

Open Photoshop. It will look like this (sans art) at first.
Navigate to the Create New button on the left, or go File > New...

Much like in Illustrator, the size of your artwork isn't critical.
However, you will want it to be at least as big as you intend to print your sticker; ideally much more. Printing your sticker larger than the file size will lead to quality loss from upscaling.

Six inch square or 8 by 6 is a fine size for starters.

Change your Pixels/Inch to 200-300 (better quality image), then Create.


Welcome to Photoshop!

You should see your Tools, the ColorPicker, and the Layers menu. If you don't, add them from the Windows menu at the top.

Our Primary Tools:

NOTE: photoshop likes to hide things! If you can't find any of these icons, click and hold on the icons of the menu until you see them. Photoshop's many tools are organized in these sub-menus.

Move Tool - move selections around the canvas. V for shortcut. Enable Show Transform Controls for a clear view of what you're seeing.

Rectangle (Shape) Tool - click and hold for more shapes. Click and drag on canvas to make a selection in that shape. Hold shift to make them "perfect" (squares, circles)

Lasso - click and drag around the screen to make a custom-border selection.

Magic Wand - click on the canvas to select all pixels of that color, on that layer. Useful for deleting large, plain backgrounds.

Crop Tool - crops the canvas. Use at the end to trim your piece.

Eraser - erases pixels.

Fill Bucket - This may start as a gradient tool. click and hold to change to fill bucket. This will fill in your selection with the current color.

Brush - does what you think! Control for how your brush behaves are located on the top bar when clicked.


Importing Your Image

Import your Image with File > Place Embedded. Don't link it!
Your image will show up on canvas. Once oriented to your liking, press the checkmark in the top-right.

Hopefully your image is already transparent, but we'll show you how to cut it out just in case.


Important! - Rasterize!

See the page-looking symbol covering part of the layer preview? That tells us this layer is a "smart object". Essentially, Photoshop will not be able to interact with it. To fix this, Right-Click and select Rasterize Image.


Deleting the Background

if your image is already cut out / has a transparent background, skip this step.

Select the Magic Wand tool and click on your unwanted background-- in this case, the nebulous grey around the girl. The Wand will select all of the matching-colored pixels. You can see the outline of its selection by the dotted line-- called Marching Ants.

If the wand does not select all of your background-- perhaps it has a gradient-- simply hold Shift and continue to click, adding to your selection.

When your selection is complete, press the Delete key to empty your selection.



Now we're left with a nice cut-out. Let's move on to prepping your image!



Uh oh! our PNG has fallen victim to one of the classic blunders; floating, disconnected objects!

Prepping Your Image

As you will see, if we took this into Illustrator, the program would draw multiple paths, one around every object, and they would overlap and cause unwanted cuts. The resulting sticker would be unusable.
This is because the process we will use to generate the outlines does so by tracing the Outline of the pixels.


Option 1 : Border Stroke

This method is a quick, easy way to bridge gaps. While it is not perfect, is is an excellent way to get started.

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A peek at the finished product.


Adding A Stroke

  1. Make sure you've selected your image layer.

  2. Select Layer from the top left and navigate to Layer > Layer Style > Stroke.

Stroke Settings

  1. Size: How thick your stroke is. edit this and see the preview change live. Adjust this until it is thick enough that all floating objects are connected by the stroke. (Keep in mind that you will not be able to trim this down later.)

  2. Position: Set this to Outside. otherwise, the stroke will clip into your image.

  3. Blend Mode and Opacity are not used for this process. Keep them at "Normal" and 100% respectively.

  4. OK!

The gaps should now be filled in! If you're satisfied, you can head to "Exporting".

However, you won't be able to trim the white border. If you want something a little thinner, read about option two below.


Option 2 : Manual Fill

In this slightly more advanced method, we'll be bridging all gaps by hand. This gives you the most control over your images' eventual cut borders, but it is more time-consuming.

  1. Create a new layer underneath your image. You don't want to be editing your image directly, as it will be harder to undo mistakes.

  2. Use the Rectangle, Elipse, or Lasso tool to make a selection, bridging the gaps between objects. See how each floating feather is touching or encapsulated by the selection.

3. Fill in the selection using the Fill Bucket tool. Use White as the fill color if you don't want it to show in the final print.

4. Furthur refine your shape using the Selection > Fill method as desired.

5. For more advanced users-- you can also do this using a Brush. Just be certain that the opacity is 100%. Absolutely no transparent or airbrush-y edges.


Before

Here's how the image would eventually process if we only had the stroke applied. See how the cut line extends into all the nooks and crannies? By combining the two techniques, we can eliminate unnecessary cuts and create a much cleaner outline.

After

By adding some manual fill -- colored blue for clarity -- you can see that the cut stroke now has a much cleaner edge.


Advanced - Manually Adjusting Border Generation

Sometimes, you may want to fill in holes that aren't technically going to cause a "problem". This cheetah will be okay to print, but I want a smoother outline, and I want to seal the hole created by her front cowlick.


For instance, the hair on this cheetah is super spiky-- in order to smooth out the edges, I've filled in much of the area between spikes.


Exporting to PNG

Let's get your prepped PNG to the next step.

  1. Hide any layers you don't want to see.

  2. IMPORTANT!! Hide your background layer. Otherwise, you won't have a transparent image!

  3. Using the crop tool (or press C), trim your canvas to fit around your image, leaving a healthy border. This makes further formatting easier.

  4. EXPORTING-- go to File > Export > Quick Export as PNG. This will quickly and easily create a PNG for you. Name the file accordingly and put it in an easily accessible location. If you want to edit the parameters, go into Export As.