Achieve Perfect Type In Photoshop

Despite strong typography support since version 6, some Photoshop users (and commercial printers) don’t know how to use vector type or, if they do, end up rasterizing it before the product is printed. This tutorial will show you how to use type and type layers, protect their vector shapes and get them to the printer intact.

Early in my career I actually did a few print layout projects in Photoshop—instead of a standard layout app like Quark or InDesign—because some effects that were necessary for the design could only be done in Photoshop, such as drop shadows and glows and all the little effects that can create depth and impact. With Photoshop 6 I was able to build type that actually was built with vectors instead of pixels, and this was a breakthrough because the barrier between vector output and Photoshop had been torn down.

And then I take my files to the printer for output.

And then the printer says the type is rasterized.

And then the printer says the only way to solve the problem is for them to build the layout from scratch. In Corel Draw.

If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn’t have allowed them to do that because technology is always changing, and if a new application can create perfect type and the printer doesn’t know how to execute and you do, then arm yourself with knowledge and show that Photoshop can indeed output great type.

TYPOGRAPHY AND THE CURRENT PHOTOSHOP

Photoshop has come a long way even since version 6 when it comes to typography control. Adobe is eliminating the differences between the Character and Paragraph palettes across the Creative Suite applications, and Photoshop has most high-end type controls including those that deal with kerning, tracking and scaling. Photoshop has had these for several years. More recent are spacing controls that have been adopted from InDesign and other top-quality layout applications:

• Hyphenation & justification (H&J) controls, which control how Photoshop inserts hyphens, breaks words and justify type
• Adobe Single-Line and Every-Line Composers, which takes H&J a step further by allowing Photoshop to consider line structure of entire paragraphs, rather than single lines, when performing H&J
• Optical alignment options, which aligns punctuation outside the type box when it falls on the box border, allowing an optically aligned block of type. Note that Photoshop calls this “Roman hanging punctuation”.

All these great new typographic controls will help you set type according to the rules of typography. For a great article on typography and some basic rules, check out the article by our publisher Pariah Burke in the latest issue of InDesign Magazine. You’ll learn a lot about punctuation and ellipses, when not to use upper case and many more important rules of typography.

Remember too that Photoshop can create type in two different ways with the Type Tool:

• Click on the document to create a single line of text. If you want it flow on multiple lines, you’ll have to add line breaks where you want them.
• Click and drag to create a type box which will constrain the type area and flow the text the same as in page layout applications. This will take advantage of the Adobe Single-Line and Every-Line Composers.

TYPE OUTPUT

Saving your Photoshop file so printers can output them properly can be a trick, but not if you remember a few rules.

NEVER flatten the image. Typing in Photoshop creates a type layer, which maintains the vectors of the type. These are what create the clean edges of type. If you rasterize the layer, flatten or merge it down, that type layer goes away and you will be left with a bitmap image that is resolution-dependent.

Use a PostScript-based file format or one that supports layers. Type is founded on the PostScript language, so it is important to use a file format that can maintain that PostScript code. EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) and PDF (Portable Document Format) will do the job nicely, and PDF will also retain layers. Other file formats that retain layers, such as Photoshop and TIFF formats, will work fine too as long as you do not flatten the image (see rule immediately above).

VECTORS AND EPS

Saving a layered file as an EPS file is probably the most common way of saving a file with type, because Quark before version 6 could not place Photoshop files (layered TIFFs are a way around this deficiency). If you do save your file as an EPS, be sure to follow the rule above about not flattening, and simply save the EPS and in the EPS Options dialog box be sure to check “Include Vector Data”. This will keep those vectors in the file and ready to output. Note that opening an EPS in Photoshop will automatically rasterize it and thus remove the vector data. Use the EPS only as a file to place in Quark or other application; if you must edit the file, go back to the Photoshop file and resave as EPS when needed.

ANOTHER WAY OF SAVING TYPE FOR OUTPUT

This is a technique that I like to use if I am creating a Photoshop file with type, and I know it may be used on other computers that don’t have the font. There’s nothing worse than Photoshop telling you your layout will change because a font is missing. As with InDesign and Illustrator, Photoshop can create outlines of your type—though it’s not called “Create Outlines” as in the other applications.

Step 1: Select a type layer, or multiple type layers if you are using Photoshop CS2.

Step 2: Select Layer –> Type –> Convert to Shape. This will create a Solid Color adjustment layer masked by the type vectors.

The pros of this technique include consistent output no matter the computer or end user’s type collection, and the ability to change the type color and use layer effects on it. The cons include the inability to edit the type, so use this technique only when you’re pretty sure there won’t be more revisions. What I like to do is duplicate my type layers (Cmd/Ctrl-J) and convert one to vector shapes and leave the other as type. I can then hide the type layers and go back to them if necessary.

TYPE IS NOT A FOUR-LETTER WORD

Though it does it a bit differently than the other CS2 applications, Photoshop can set type just as well as any other application. The techniques used to set perfect type and get it to the printer properly are different and take a moment to learn, but don’t believe it when other designers say that Photoshop only outputs pixels. Early in my career I was using Photoshop and a little-known application called InDesign to create type for output, and I probably used Photoshop in half these situations. It was tough teaching others it could be done, but it was true then and it’s true now.