photoshop alpha channel into TB

Retired Products Toon Boom Studio General Discussion
1

Hi All -

I have an image in photoshop and need to import it into ToonBoom. I understand that I need to create an alpha channel in photoshop that creates a transparent background thereby allowing me to use the toonboom background. Has anyone created a transparent alpha background in photoshop 7 and if so, what steps did you perform to accomplish it… seems like no matter what steps I take to create the alpha channel in photoshop, when i import it into toonboom into an image element I still have a box around the image - I have tried many file formats as well with no success… any info is appreciated… thanks …

2

::slight_smile: hi all -

never mind… I have it working… problem was that I was highlighting the cell I was working in and the box was appearing around it…as soon as I moved to an adjacent cell the image remained and the box was gone… thanks - I’m sure I’ll be back looking for more help ;D

3

Hi,
I’m having the exact same problem. I’m trying to bring a bitmap into TB with the surrounding area transparent. I’ve tried many different formats without luck. I keep getting the “box” instead of just the graphic. Could you tell me how you got it to work, which format, etc.? I’m also using PS7.
Thanks.
Manny

4

im using Photoshop CS2, so i dunno if itll work on 7, but heres what i do.

I just hide the background layer, so everything i want transparent is transparent, then simply save it as a PNG format, high quality and it preserves the transperity

5

Hi both of you. Just to give you a bit more info, the following file types support an alpha channel when saved from PS (in version 7, there maybe more if you’re using CS)

Photoshop PSD
CompuServe GIF
Photoshop PDF
PNG
Targa
TIFF

Of these, the ones tb supports (including the alpha) are the PNG, Targa, TIFF, PSD.

I dont claim to know everything so if i’ve made a mistake and someone knows some other format or if ive gotten something wrong please feel free to correct me :slight_smile:

Chris.

6

Thanks for the help.
I tried saving it as a PNG and it worked. For some reason, I can’t get the other formats to work, but…, as long as I can get the bitmap in, I’m happy!

7

Oh well png is probably the best type anyway, the other file types are really big files generally speaking. But

as long as I can get the bitmap in, I’m happy!

(not sure if that worked ^)

You cant get a bitmap with the alpha channel…

Chris.

8

at least is png a lossless format (while, say, gif isn’t)
rob