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Something happened to me a few minutes ago that
I would like to share with you. Maybe it is the advancing age
thing, I'm not sure. Sometimes it takes awhile (the span of time
in these episodes seems to be increasing) for the simplest
concepts to finally sink in. Perhaps I read about this neat
little trick somewhere online, but to me it is a revelation. I
love that about Photoshop... it never ceases to amaze.
I hate to admit it, but I've had an aversion to
paths for years. Call me old fashioned, but if I had my way the
Photonic Disintigrator never would have been invented, and
people would still use their teeth to chew food. Basically I
find the newer a concept, the more suspect it becomes. Again,
the age thing. I do remember the days when I had no concept of
layers, then an allergy to channels... hopefully my mental
dyslexia for paths is dissipating as well. Here's what I found.
I've been playing with the notion of packaging
custom shapes into my next CD and offering them for download on
my website. So in fiddling with creating these shapes, some from
scratch and some using the B&W images I use for many custom
brushes, I discovered that each shape shows up in the paths
palette as a work path. Why was I in the paths palette, you ask?
Because in order to define my custom shape, I had to convert my
selection into a path and select the custom shapes tool in the
toolbar. Then making sure my path was active and in mask mode
(well, it looks like mask mode: depress the small button on the
bottom of the paths palette that looks like marching ants), you
go to Edit>Define Custom Shape. You new shape will now appear in
the options bar, where you can save, reuse, distribute, etc...
all those fun things I love to do with Photoshop. Why create a
cool tool and not share it with others? It boggles the mind! But
I digress...
The thought occurred to me through all this,
though. If I can turn picture into a shape, a shape into a path
and a path into a selection, why couldn't I then run my actions
on that selection? Any of you who have used my text effects
actions knows that I use the type mask tool for 99.9% of my
actions. Since the type mask tool is a selection, and I can turn
a path into a selection... well, two plus two equals a big vat
of cheese, right?
Let me show you what I'm talking about. To begin
with, let's say I have a black and white image I want to convert
to a custom shape.
Checkboxes are always cool. Anyway, first I want
to select the black area. Next I need to go to the paths palette
and hit the Icon 'Make Work Path from Selection'.
Next, convert the path back into a selection via
the icon or from the paths menu. Select the custom shape tool,
go back to the paths palette and select the work path icon to
make it active. Now go to Edit>Define Custom Shape, name your
shape and hit 'OK'.
Now in the Shape Options Bar, if you open the
custom shapes drop down you should see your new design in the
roster.
I have several of my text effects actions loaded
into the actions palette, so say I want to run one of these on
the shape I just created. As the action creates a new image
while it begins running, I'll go ahead and start the action.
This particular action is one I call
Carmel
Lite, which I'm including for download with this article.
With the first action 'Stop' we receive the message to enter our
text with the type mask tool. Instead of doing this I'm going to
select the Custom Shape tool and, in the center of the new
image, draw my shape to a decent size. Before I start the action
again, I go back to the paths palette, turn my path (the shape
is a path, remember?) into a selection, and press play again.
And here is the result:
I can now also use this same checkbox and apply
any layer style I like to it:
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