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Vectorworks 10, placed images


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I have been asked to prepare some images for placing into a vectorworks 10 document. The client needs the objects to be 'cut out' from their background to allow correct positioning.

Can anyone tell me if this is possible, and if so, how should I be preparing the image files.

We have experimented with EPS with a 'clipping path' created in Photoshop but are having no joy so far.

Anny help will be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

David

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I do that in Photoshop, first using the Wand to select all the white background around the image, then executing the Inverse Selection command, then New Layer by Copy, then turning off the background layer, then selecting the entire image with the Marquee, then the Copy command, then Paste in VectorWorks.

Strangely, any white areas in the trimmed image always come into VW as voids (though if I do the same process with the untrimmed image the internal whites come in as white). So I have to add a white-filled VW surface of the same overall shape, behind the image, and usually I Group the two to preserve the proper relative position and layering.

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Thanks jan15 for your suggestion.

Unfortunately I don't think that the copy and paste method will be suitable on this occassion as I have 500 images to prepare and supply to my client, ready for them to place into vectorworks, with the background removed.

Any ideas?

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Perhaps, you can set up an 'Action Script' in Photoshop and if you are on a Mac you can also use Apple Events to manage the import & export & save to file actions. Use an app like Clarisworks ( Appleworks) or Word or Filemaker as the 'intermediary translator'.

Avoid copy & paste ... use import&export instead.

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Thank you, Delmer! Setting the Fill attribute to None seems to accomplish the same thing as the time I've been wasting in Photoshop.

Unfortunately for David, he still needs to make 500 white-filled polygons shaped like the images. Unless perhaps they're all the same shape? Or don't have any white in them? I wonder if making the external background a color that doesn't occur in the image itself would solve that?

[ 05-24-2005, 11:48 AM: Message edited by: jan15 ]

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No, no, he just deletes the white space in pshp with the magic wand. In VW select all and set fill to none if not already. Set as solid if no transparency is desired.

-- and oftentimes, depending on what the source of the image is, it is not even necessary to photoshop edit, whites will shut off when fill is set to none.

[ 05-24-2005, 12:38 PM: Message edited by: Delmer ]

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Of course, the only reason I needed to put a white-filled polygon behind the image was because I was putting the image in front of something else that wasn't white (for example, placing a sign with the company's logo on a wall in a color-rendered elevation).

If David's images are just going to sit on VW's plain white background, it doesn't matter whether the internal white areas in the image are white or void, so he doesn't need the white-filled polygons. He can just import the image file, with or without Photoshop, and set fill to None. I assumed that he was putting them in front of some non-white thing, because I thought if he weren't he wouldn't have been able to see the external white backgound.

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Right, but "any white areas" includes (if, say, the image I'm trying to import is an oval):

--any white pixels inside the oval,

--whatever white background was around the oval in the source file,

--or, if I've pasted in from a Photoshop layer with no background around the oval, then any area outside the oval but inside the smallest rectangle that can include the oval.

In other words, VectorWorks seems to insist on a white rectangle behind an image, which can be turned off by setting fill to None. But, bizarre as it may seem, any pure white pixels in the image are imported as voids, so that they appear white only when that white rectangle is turned on.

Doesn't it work that way on your machine?

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Thanks for persisting through with your explanation. I see what you're saying now.

Here is one alternative that has its place:

An RGB value of 254, 254, 254 is a gray very very close to being indistinguishable from white. If areas that one wants to be opaque are set to this value VW will read them as a solid and they will not become transparent with the true whites when fill is set to none.

[ 05-25-2005, 01:27 AM: Message edited by: Delmer ]

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Click on your foreground color and in the dialogue box that comes up punch those numbers into the RGB spaces. Then you can magic wand or marquee any white areas and use the paint bucket to fill them with the foreground color. If you set your preferences to show a grid it will be easier to see transparent areas.

As far as selecting specific pixel ranges, you can eyedropper an item to determine its value in the foreground color box. After you select a certain value range by setting the magic wand tolerance you can go to the Select pulldown and "Select Similar".

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I guess my approach would be this:

Set grid in prefs.

Set Magic wand tolerance to 10 or 20, select a white area, select similar, delete.

Then, go back and fill in areas that you want opaque with the light grey.

Not too strenuous once you get into it.

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Bingo! That does it. I had forgotten about the Select Similar command.

But after Select Similar I just did Fill... No need to delete. And immediately after that I Wanded the background again, and did a Select Inverse, Copy, and Paste into VW, then set fill to None.

And I like 80 or more for the Wand tolerance, because on the second wanding the higher tolerance helps to eliminate the whitish edges around the perimeter of the image. Those look really bad against a darker background color, on the print-out from VW even if not on-screen.

It's simple enough that David could even do his 500 images. Once the Wand tolerance is set and the Foreground Color is set to (254,254,254), you just open a JPEG file, one click with the Wand, 2 pull-down commands, another wand click, 2 more pull-downs, and paste into VW. Then on to the next JPEG, and when you're all done, select them all and set fill to None.

If David's still around. David? Well, no matter, this will come in handy for me. I'm glad we had this discussion.

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