Adobe Fireworks CS3 Tutorials
Pages/Layers/Masks / Editing Masks
Visitors to VTC.com will be able to view all introductory videos for each training course.
Free Trial Members will gain access to first three chapters for each training course.
Full Access Members have full access to VTC.com�s entire library of video tutorials.
Learn More
Subtitles of the Movie (Adobe Fireworks CS3 / Pages/Layers/Masks / Editing Masks)
Let me, in this movie, demonstrate some additional techniques for editing your image masks. You can modify a mask in a variety of ways. You can modify a mask's position, shape, and color. You can change the visibility of masked objects. You can also change a mask's type and the way it's applied. In addition, masks can also be replaced, disabled, or deleted. I demonstrated some of these techniques in the previous movies, but let me concentrate on editing masks here. The results of editing a mask are immediately visible, even if the masked object itself is not visible on the canvas. For example, I can click on this icon of my mask right there, and then notice that the icon has a green border on it. That indicates that I can modify the mask itself. So if I take my Sub-selection tool, for example, you can see the outline of that mask, and I can modify it, and, as I mentioned, the results are immediately visible of the changes that you're making. I can also click on that blue star and move the position of the mask, so different portions of the photograph in this case show through. So the Layers panel here is instrumental in helping you identify what part of the mask you're working on. Clicking on the mask icon there puts a green border around the shape so you can then work on the masked shape. Clicking on the thumbnail of the image, in this case, a picture, indicates that you can modify the picture itself including the location of the image. Notice that you can work on the opacity of the image itself, if you click on the thumbnail of the image, notice that my opacity of just the image itself there, is decreasing, or increasing. So to summarize, to help you select the masks and the masked objects, you'll want to use the Layers panel using the thumbnails here, in this way they can be easily identified what you're working on. Mostly you're going to know when you click on the mask itself and it gets this green border, and then you have the little chain icon, then you can select the Sub-selection tool, and modify the actual vector shape of that mask there. Now you can either move the mask and it's masked object together, or you can move them independently, and you'll use the link-icon right here in the Layers panel. If you click the link icon here in the mask in the Layers panel that'll unlink or link up the two with the link icon there, you'll notice that the two are linked together, the mask and the masked object. Let's Unlink, and notice that this changes now. I'm moving now the masked shape and the image underneath it is not moving. So that's another very visual way that you can work with your mask and separate the mask from the masked object underneath. Now, so far, In this movie, I've demonstrated how to change the shape of a vector mask by moving the mask's object points, but you can also change the shape of a bitmap mask by drawing on it with the bitmap tools. To demonstrate this technique let me move back to a bitmap image here. And let's, from the Main menu, choose Modify, Mask, and apply a Hide All mask to this. Let's go ahead and select that bitmap image first, let's hide everything, and now let's take my Gradient tool, right here. I have a grayscale, linear gradient applied to that, and let's apply the gradient. Notice that I can reveal different parts of my underlying bitmap. Notice that there's my gradient right there, the black will block everything and the white allows everything through, and the gray is partial. But I can modify the actual bitmap there of the gradient to affect what's showing through. I can also take one of the bitmap tools and actually paint on my canvas to modify the actual mask itself. Notice that that thumbnail changes a little bit. Let's go ahead and increase my brush size, change my edge value, and notice that that's changing there, in other words, I'm painting black on there and I'm modifying that mask. In this case it's a bitmap mask. Yet one more way of modifying your masks is to use the modify command here and then using the Reveal selection or Hide selection. Let me go back to my image here, my bitmap image of the mountain, and choose the Magic Wand tool, and I'm going to select a portion of the picture down here, these rocks. I'm holding down the Shift key and selecting more of the image there, and then from the Main menu, choose Modify, Mask, Reveal Selection, and that will reveal the portions of the image underneath that selection. Now I can take my brush tool and with the brush chip set to black, I'll erase all of the portion underneath that selection by modifying my mask, but I can also choose colors that are not black, but maybe a shade of gray. And the lighter the shade of gray, the more of the image is left behind. So that's a pretty light gray, so, notice that I'm removing only a little bit of the color there. If I go with a slightly darker gray, it will remove more of my image. Again, white will remove nothing. Let's go ahead and change that color chip to white, notice that I'm removing - oop, that's the wrong one. Let's change one to white. It needs to be the foreground color chip there. Notice that I'm actually adding color back if I go with white. And then, the other extreme is black, will remove everything on the picture, and then the grays will remove more or less depending on how dark the gray is. The lighter the gray is, the less it will remove. So, that's another interesting way of editing your masks. So there you have a pretty thorough demonstration of how to work with masks, how to work with bitmap masks and modify them, and also how to work and modify vector masks.
Tutorial Information
| Course: | Adobe Fireworks CS3 |
| Author: | James Gonzalez |
| SKU: | 33836 |
| ISBN: | 1-934743-42-9 |
| Release Date: | 2008-01-25 |
| Duration: | 8.5 hrs / 93 lessons |
| Work Files: |
Yes |
| Captions: | No |
| Compatibility: |
Vista/XP/2000, OS X, Linux QuickTime 7, Flash 8 |
VTC Sign up & Benefits
- Unlimited Access
- 81,350 Video Tutorials (14,200 free)
- Video Available as Flash or QuickTime
- Over 715 Courses
- $30 for One Month Access
- Multi-User Discounts Available
