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Changing Text Transparency to Color
I’m embarrassed both that I can’t figure out how to do this inside Illustrator but that I also can’t seem to enter the right search parameters in Google to find a way to do it, so I must turn to the Creative Cow Community for what is hopefully a very simple answer to a fairly basic question.
I’m using some blocky/balloon text, a font called Pinewood if you’re familiar with it, the kind that has dead space in addition to color. While I can change the color of the text without difficulty, I can’t seem to figure out a way to change the transparent dead space to another color. Here’s the font:
https://www.dafont.com/pinewood.font
If you view it, you’ll see that the “knots” and “bark” are black and the “wood” is apparently white. In Illustrator, the white is actually transparent. Is there a way to change it from transparent to color? Say, black for the bark and red for the wood? I’ve tried creating clipping masks and outlines, but everything I do seems to only key off of the black. Thank you in advance for any assistance you can offer!
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5 Replies
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Hi,
it’s fairly simple:
1) convert the font to outlines.
2)select the converted font.
3)with the font selected go to …,
and while everything still selected GO TO
4) go to and select . Now you should be able to see and select the formerly transparent areas only with your selection tool and color it to your likening.hope that helps.
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Hi Adolf,
Thanks so much for responding. I attempted this last night, but any color changes I make to the transparent area affect the entire outline group, so I decided this wasn’t going to work. However, on your advice, I tried again, and realized that if I copied the transparent areas and pasted them OUTSIDE the outline group, I was able to change their color without difficulty. It’s clunky, but it’ll work. Do you or anyone else know of a way to change the color of the transparent area while it’s inside the outline group? That would be much easier. Thank you again!
– Jc3
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lets do it again.
1: convert font to outlines.
2: select everything and go to…object…compound path….RELEASE.
3: with everything selected…UNGROUP.After that the transparent parts are selectable with the selection tool.
cheers -
That did it. Your original post didn’t have the crucial step that involved going to OBJECT -> COMPOUND PATH -> Release. That was an amazing fix! Thank you so much for your help, I am very grateful for the assistance!
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I’m glad you got it worked out. Yes my original post didn’t have the crucial steps because I put those in “tags” and when posted the contents of the tags got stripped off…my bad.
cheers
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