Alpha Transparency from CorelDraw

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You can create some lovely drop shadow effects in Corel Draw and with a little extra trickery, bring them into PowerPoint as alpha-masked bitmap images.

Here's the drill in Draw 11 ...

First, be sure you've installed Service Pack 1, downloadable from www.corel.com
You can't export alpha transparent images directly without it.

Start Draw and for this example, create some text, format and size it to taste and add a drop shadow using the interactive shadow tool. Make sure you've selected both the text and the shadow, then:

• Choose File, Export. In the Export dialog box
• Select a folder and filename for the exported file
• Choose PNG in the "Save as type" list box
• Put a checkmark next to "Selected only"
• Click Export
• The Convert Bitmap dialog appears:
• Put a checkmark next to "Transparent background"
• We recommend a checkmark next to "Antialiased" as well - it's a matter of taste though
• Set the export size to suit your needs
• Click OK
• The PNG Export dialog box appears:
• Click Masked Area
• Click Preview
• Rightclick the left preview image to zoom out so more of the image is visible
• The mask may not be apparent - try choosing another preview color (it won't export)
• Click OK
• Switch to PowerPoint and use Insert, Picture, From File to import your new image
• Enjoy

Search terms:Corel,Draw,alpha,transparency,mask,shadow

Contents © 1995 - 2008 Stephen Rindsberg, Rindsberg Photography, Inc. and members of the MS PowerPoint MVP team. You may link to this page but any form of unauthorized reproduction of this page's contents is expressly forbidden.

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