When we show off our work or hopefully our customer’s work you want it to show well, be well lit, we want it to stand out. Framing is a great way to highlight any art but when we want to do this on our web site, we have a few tools to choose from. I just created a display for a friend that does beautiful tile work. It looks great, great tile work, great images, but it needed a little something. I realized that framing the display, framing would really help set it stand out highlight the entries.
How would I frame the tile displays? What better than the tile itself… with a little alpha channel assistance from Photoshop and layer blending in After Effects this should be a pretty easy task. I thought of so many presentations, whether it be business product presentation or just a family album that would show so well with this technique, this definitely deserves sharing.
Choose the image that you want to be your border. It will help to construct the presentation slide show in After Effects first to have a simple ‘before and after’ contrast to evaluate your border. Note the composition size since this will determine the border size you will create in Photoshop.
Open the image you have chosen for your border in Photoshop. In my case, I chose a row of tile that I wanted to be my frame border. You might do the same thing with a pattern or texture that you duplicate four times in Photoshop creating a top, bottom, right, and left border band but you could just as easily choose a shape that you will ‘alpha out’ the center so that it becomes your outside frame.
In either case, once you have constructed your border in Photoshop, we will create an alpha channel in the center to remove the portion where our images will appear when we use this finished image in After Effects. A simple way to create your alpha using proportion is to copy your image layer, scale it down 90% by using the free transform tool: entering ‘Ctrl T’, then entering 90% for width and height (just below the toolbar). Use this ‘inside image’ guide to create your alpha, the part of the picture you want to show through.
Highlight this reduced part of your image then select inverse. When you create a new channel Photoshop will create the channel in the section that is not selected, the inverse of your selection which will be the frame for your image. Now under the channels tab, save this selection as a channel, the second icon from the left under the channels tab: ‘Save selection as channel’. If you click the eye icon next to your new channel it will highlight with the default red indicating the area that has been added to this new alpha channel. This is the portion that will not be visible in your saved file.
Save your selection as a targa, ‘tga’ file type then import your new file into After Effects. Place this new file as the top layer in your composition and you will see your newly created frame with the layer beneath showing through.
These simple steps create an alpha transparent area and in this case, create your desired frame with a transparent area for your display. When you import this file into After Effects, placing it as the top layer in any composition will show it over any below, but the layers beneath will appear through the center, the alpha area.
This same technique can be used for many applications, blending images and video together in creative ways.
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