Here’s a basic technique that I’ve been asked about several times recently: How to set up a lighter area behind text, so that you can read the text on top of a dark background. In CS2 and earlier, it was necessary to set up two or more frames to achieve this effect. In CS3 and later, it’s far easier:
1. In Object > Text Frame Options, increase the Text Inset value so you have some space between the edge of the frame and the text.
2. Set the background fill color of the text frame to Paper (or some other color).
3. Click on Fill in the Effects panel. This is the crux of the tip: You can choose Object, Fill, Stroke, or Text in the Effects panel. By clicking Fill first, the effect will only apply to the frame’s fill color.
4. Lower the Opacity value to something like 70%. That’s it! You have now ghosted back the fill color, which is the same as lightening up whatever is behind it.
5. If you want a softer edge, select Basic Feather from the Effects pop-up menu (at the bottom of the Effects panel), while Fill is still selected. (Of course, you could use Directional or Gradient Feather instead… it just depends on the “blurry edge” effect you’re trying to achieve.
Of course, this also works for darkening an area behind text, or just changing it to something different, using different blending modes and so on. But I’ll leave that to you to explore.
Actually, here’s one other method, with a very different look: You can set the background fill of the frame to None, then apply an Outer Glow effect to the text. Make sure you increase the Spread value in the Effects dialog box, to get a strong “glow” or else you’ll barely be able to see it:
Personally, I don’t like that look as much, but as they say: There’s no accounting for taste!
This article was last modified on December 1, 2023
This article was first published on June 22, 2009
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wow!! amazing post. thank you for sharing. it’s really helpful post for me.
Thanks very much for this clear and simple explanation
Hi David,
Yup, sorry about that. By chance could you point me to a video that talks about Ghosted Background behind text? Just wondering.
Regards,
Manny
Hi and thank you for your post.
I am dealing with photoshop cc and I have a banner for my newsletter that I need to make a portion of it as you describe. I can’t find the Object > Text Frame Options you are talking about. Is this in some other program other than adobe photoshop?
@Manny2013: Ummm… yup. You probably jumped here from a google search or something and didn’t notice the name or topic of the website you were on.
Really amazing post. thx for post!
I do this sometimes too, for quick-and-dirty, but I wonder if anyone would care to comment on what used to be a common recommendation to separate ghosted areas specifically with no GCR (no content on K), and also to rebias saturation to counteract the desaturation that accompanies this one-step approach.
I suggest that a Photoshop-based approach to ghosting can allow much more subtle tweaking. (Although, again, I use InDesign myself for ghosting fairly frequently.)
I use the effects panel all the time, every day.
I use a custom keyboard shortcut to bring up Transparency (from which it’s easy to access all the other effects).
Funny though, I never noticed you can just select ‘Fill’ in the effects panel and it won’t make the text transparent! Genius! I will be using that a lot!
Feathering and drop shadows…oh InDesign..how I love thee.
This was one of the first effects I used when CS3 came out!
Coincidence? Just a few days ago I used the first ghosted background. Took me half a day to figure out. I more or less had to. Was not satisfied though. I used an opacity of 80, and still thinks it was to low. If you do not hear of me again in ten days (when its back from the printer) I’m hiding behind the moon in shame.
The second one, with outer-glow I used -to my own horror- a few years ago. (find out by accident, wanted a glow on a frame) Never used it again.
In my opinion (indeed there?s no accounting for taste!) both but surely the second makes text hard to read. But it’s still beats (black) text over a not ghosted picture of dark rock, night-sky, etc. The designer of a magazine I’m subscribed to seems to love that…
Love the tulips. As if you made this post just for me!
@
p.s. Hope i do not sound to aggressive. Just wanted to share my opinion. Use this wit care