Background, transperancy, deleting bounding box

Jeff Johnston

unread,

May 7, 2003, 1:25:48 PM5/7/03

to

When I am importing a photoshop file into Illustrater (a picture that has been outlined) Illustrator adds a square bounding box around my roundish oblong photo, the effect of which is to add a nontransparent background.

1) Is it possible to stop Illustrater from putting a bounding box?

The problem is that the bounding box is not transperant. I want the image itself to not be transparent, but I want to be able to deal with just the image when I'm putting in multiple layers, not an interfering square.

LenHewitt

unread,

May 7, 2003, 1:33:25 PM5/7/03

to

Jeff,

Every raster image is rectangular. The file format states it is so many
pixels by so-many pixels.

However, if your image has a transparent b/g in Photoshop, and you Save As
.PSD and Place that in Illustrator (v9 and v.10), the transparency will be
retained.

If you have an earlier version of Illustrator, you will need to create a
clipping path in Photoshop and Save As .EPS or create a clipping Mask in
Illustrator.

Ed A. Ortiz

unread,

May 8, 2003, 11:47:04 AM5/8/03

to

Maybe I'm misunderstanding the Q, but you can shut off the Bounding Box from the view menu.

Harron K. Appleman

unread,

May 8, 2003, 5:14:55 PM5/8/03

to

Ed,

What Jeff calls a "bounding box" and what you (and Illustrator) call a "bounding box" are not the same thing.

Jeff is mistakenly assuming that Illustrator is "adding" a box to his raster images.

Len's advice should put Jeff on the right track.

=-= Harron =-=

Jeff Johnston

unread,

May 9, 2003, 10:59:19 AM5/9/03

to

Okay,

Thanks for your help so far, but now I'm wondering if I even know enough to ask the right question.

I followed the Illustrator help instructions to create a clipping mask, but the program will not let me press the icon in the window. (It is that faded gray inactive button color).

Does this mean that the outline from Photoshop did not import?

I know the outline works in photoshop because I have the gray grid up to show transperency. In Photoshop the gray grid is there, in Illustrator it is not.

Any help appreciated as far as a step by step help me get this photo from Photoshop into Illustrator with no background.

Also, if there is a way to set preferences so this will never happen again, thanks in advance for letting me know how.

Your time is appreciated!

Jeff

Alexander Kogan.

unread,

May 9, 2003, 11:33:00 AM5/9/03

to

Jeff,

the program will not let me press the icon in the window.

Which icon are you referring to? The clipping masks are made by putting a vector object over another object (vector or bitmap), selecting them both and going to Object>Clipping Mask>Make (or just hitting Ctrl-7).

If you have your image with transparent background in Photoshop, you can, as Len said, save it as PSD and then place it in Illustrator - the transparency will be preserved (unless you are using a version previous to AI9).

Jeff Johnston

unread,

May 9, 2003, 11:57:09 AM5/9/03

to

Thanks Alex,

It is not preserving the transperancy!

It is a PSD file, it is transparent in Photoshop, it is not transparent in Illustrator.

Thanks for your help in advance, again.

Jeff

LenHewitt

unread,

May 9, 2003, 12:10:09 PM5/9/03

to

Jeff,

You won't see the chequered b/g in Illustrator, and you don't need a
clipping path or clipping mask with transparent b/g PSD files. If it is
transparent in Photoshop it will be transparent in Illustrator - try
dragging it over a rectangle of another colour to confirm.

Jeff Johnston

unread,

May 9, 2003, 12:20:26 PM5/9/03

to

Hi Guys!

I have confirmed that it is NOT transparent after dragging it into Illustrator. That is the whole problem.

I read through 2 hours of faq's, manauls, etc.... before posting.

I can assure you that it was transparent in Photoshop (tested), and is not transparent in Illustrator.

My theory is that there is some obscure MS window that I have to find that has some wierd preference preset that is making this background appear.

Thanks again.

Ed A. Ortiz

unread,

May 9, 2003, 12:46:46 PM5/9/03

to

Jeff,

I don't know how familiar you are with PS/AI, so please excuse the question.

In PS is the background white or can you see the white/grey grid?

Sorry Jeff, you posted just before I did, so disregard the question. :)

Joel Stransky

unread,

May 9, 2003, 12:45:57 PM5/9/03

to

AI should ask you what weather you would like to place in photoshop 5 or photoshop 6 format. For some unfathomable reason, placing using the version 5 meathod retains the transparancy and 6 does not.

Alexander Kogan.

unread,

May 9, 2003, 1:08:03 PM5/9/03

to

Jeff,

you still haven't said what Illustrator version you are using. Versions eariler than 9 won't work with transparency.

I have confirmed that it is NOT transparent after dragging it into Illustrator.

Do you mean that you actually drag the image into Illustrator? In this case, I would advice to try placing it properly through the File>Place menu.

Alexander Kogan.

unread,

May 9, 2003, 1:55:34 PM5/9/03

to

Jeff,

I have a stange feeling that we're missing something here, but anyway: let's assume it's something wrong with the program and delete the AIPREFS file (search the forum for "aiprefs delete" to see more details about how to find and delete it). It'll reset all the preferences to the factory defaults, just to be sure the program is alright.

Ed A. Ortiz

unread,

May 9, 2003, 2:01:50 PM5/9/03

to

I'm sorry Jeff, I don't follow. Are you saying you DO see the grid. If you do, then you have a transparent background.

Jeff Johnston

unread,

May 9, 2003, 1:40:18 PM5/9/03

to

Illustrator 10
Photoshop 7

Tried dragging and File Place menu commands.

Still is not transparent. When you use the show transperency grid off of the view menu, the gray and white checkerboard covers everything but my image, which of course, I already know is NOT transparent because it is obscuring another image.

Any ideas?

Jeff Johnston

unread,

May 9, 2003, 3:15:38 PM5/9/03

to

Thanks, problem solved.

The photograph that I was using was a copy from a disk that I had dragged onto my desktop.

I started from the original disk, using the File Place command FROM THE DISK so as to start at the original file.

I used the flatten to one layer command while importing (the key!), and voila, the background was transparent in Illustrator also.

Alexander Kogan.

unread,

May 9, 2003, 3:38:29 PM5/9/03

to

I used the flatten to one layer command while importing (the key!), and
voila, the background was transparent in Illustrator also.

Now, I'm getting really interested :))) Cause the Flatten Image command (if we're talking about the same thing) flattens all of the layers and sets the background to white, making so the image non-transparent! :)

Do you mean that when you used the Flatten command, the image lost its transparency? Or am I loosing something? :)

Deirdre Finter

unread,

May 12, 2003, 1:33:27 AM5/12/03

to

I'm having the same problem - I have a tiff file (logo) that was provided to me and it has a transparent background, whether I use it in Illustrator, Pagemaker or Photoshop. I haven't been able to repeat this - when I tried the flatten command I did not get a transparent background either (when I made a copy of the file it lost its transparency as well).

Alexander Kogan.

unread,

May 12, 2003, 12:33:50 PM5/12/03

to

Deirdre,

you can save a TIFF with alfa channels and/or paths embedded, but AFAIK, AI don't get advantage of neither of them as other applications (like Quark, for example) do. That is, if you import a TIFF in AI, it will always be a rectangular non-transparent image.

You can either save it as a PSD with transparent background or use a clipping mask in AI to hide the unwanted portions of the image.