Newbie. I downloaded some images from All-Free-Download. The image has text on it. From what I understand, I can edit that text, but I do not know how. I read, "This image is a vector illustration and can be scaled to any size without loss of resolution. This image will download as a .eps file. You will need a vector editor to use this file (such as Adobe Illustrator). " So I started Googling, and from what I gather, Inscape is comparable to Adobe illustrator, so I downloaded Inkscape to see if I could figure it out how to edit the text. No such luck. LOL.

I am clueless. I've checked YouTube for instructional videos, to no avail. I need to know how to edit that text. Can anyone here guide me as to how to do that? Or do you know where I can find instructions in "baby terms"?

The download probably comes with a jpg file and an eps file.
Having downloaded some of the files from this site I notice that they look fine in Photoshop (a truly ancient version) but some have serious problems in Inkscape - they open, but some gradient filled objects lose their gradient and are instead given an unset/unset style.This may not affect your file. Some display perfectly. Which file are you trying?
Who knows where the problem is - not in Ghostscript, because gsview displays it properly...
Do you have Ghostscript installed on your computer, and have you identified the path to it in your Path variable? Is the last question completely meaningless to you?

Welcome to InkscapeForum!

While EPS is a vector format, there could still be some raster content within the file. Any raster content will not be editable with Inkscape. Have you been able to open the EPS file with Inkscape? If so, please click once on the text using the Selection tool , to select it. Then look at the status bar and tell us what it says about the text.

If you haven't been able to open it, you might need to download something else. See this topic for instructions: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=820

Oops, I see druban has beat me to the punch!

well,you might still be able to cover up the text. If the background is all one color, then you could create say a rectangle of the same background color and place it on top of the text, and it appears to be gone. Or, you might be able to put the entire object in as a pattern, then use it as a fill, (create a rectangle and fill it with the pattern), then edit the pattern. It just depends on how complicated the design is and if it's worth doing.
Maybe you could also trace the design, then remove those nodes.
Also, if this is not a free file, maybe the designed added something so others can't edit it or use it without permission.
Without seeing what the original file is, its hard to tell, and I'm not an expert on work arounds.

THANK YOU so much for such a quick response. I'm too pooped to fool with it tonight, but I will piddle with it tomorrow. Again, thank you for such a quick response!!!

what file are you downloading ?

instructions should be
unzip
open somefile.eps with inkscape
select whole page
shift+ctl+g to ungroup the items (repeat if necessary)
now you should be able to edit text

Druban,

I've worked as a court reporter in the past, and I prided myself on learning the technology of speech recognition and providing the attorney a live text feed of the testimony while a scopist was editing the text live in a remote location. Had it all figured out, all the hardware and software in that field. I was very involved in the court reporting arena, statewide and nationally, monitoring a few court reporter forums, taught for a short stent at a court reporting college, and speaking at conventions. Felt secure and confident that I knew my stuff. Well, I'm no longer a court reporter. I am now creating a website for our community where I will provide locals with a community calendar, photo gallery, volunteer opportunities, interest groups, business directory, surveys, classifieds, discussion forum, and more. I plan to allow for business advertising, which is why I need to learn how to edit these vector thingamabobs, being that I am designing the ads for the website. I live in a small country-bumpkin, podunkville town, and I've seen the cheap, ugly ads circulating. I don't want those ugly things on my website. I need to be able to design some nice looking ads. I've been doing that in PowerPoint, adding photos, adding gradient backgrounds, etc. I'm patting myself on the back for learning what "gradient" is and how to play around with it. And I must say, I think some of my ads look fairly decent. But I need to be able to do more. I am TOTALLY out of my element when it comes to this stuff, so I have to learn from scratch. Ugh! I'm too old for this! I think I need to learn Photoshop, too. Actually, I'm not sure at this point what tools I need to get the job done. I'm learning as I go. Got a looooooong way to go. I contemplated attending our local college in order to learn about graphics, but I need to learn it NOW, not over a six-month period. Those educational YouTube videos are helping though. LOL. That's the extent of my higher education at this point.

But I wanted to thank you for taking the time to actually download some of the All-free-download images and piddling with them in order to help me. I sincerely appreciate that!

You mentioned "Ghostscript." Never heard of it, so I Googled it. And, of course, it is way over my head. I'll get there eventually though. I'll frequent this forum as part of my formal education. LOL.

Thank you for your time, and I hope to see you here more in the future.

Brynn,

Thank you for the warm welcome!! I have most certainly found a jewel with this forum, and am looking forward to reading as many posts as I can to get up to speed! Vector? Rastor? Still over my head. I'm still in the lime green phase. Haven't even made it to real green yet. LOL. But I'll get there soon enough.

After much ado, I was able to finally get my image opened in Inkscape. I clicked on the text, but the entire image box was selected. I'm not familiar with all of the correct terminology yet, so I'm not sure if I can even describe that well. But the whole image was selected. I was not able to select only the text. Oh, and I couldn't figure out where the "status bar" was. Once I clicked on the image, I looked around to see if there was some type of text describing the image, and I wasn't able to find one; although, it's probably right in front of my face, no doubt.

And thank you for the instructional link. I read some of it a few weeks ago, and then my eyes started crossing, so I took a break. LOL. I need to go back to it again and read some more. The info usually sinks in on the second or third pass. LOL.

Flamingolady,

Actually, your recommendation for covering up the text is exactly what I've been doing. I only run into a problem when the background has a gradient fill, or if I cannot match the same color. That's when I wish that I could simply edit the text. You wrote, "Or, you might be able to put the entire object in as a pattern, then use it as a fill, (create a rectangle and fill it with the pattern), then edit the pattern." "Maybe you could also trace the design, then remove those nodes." I'm still in the learning phases, so I don't understand what you mean, but I plan to get there eventually!!!!! I'm determined to get this stuff figured out!!!

V1nce,

I'm not sure how to "unzip" a file, but I must have done it inadvertently, because I somehow got it loaded into Inkscape. Don't ask me how though! Took me about two hours. LOL.

Okay, I selected the whole image -- I'm assuming that's what you mean when you say "select whole page" -- and then I did the shift+cntrl+g thing, and nothing happened. I did that three or four times.

I'm been trying to edit this file, just for experimental purposes: http://all-free-download.com/free-vecto ... 49195.html

It's never too late. The brain still works and learns easily as long as there's will, but that's where the stopper usually is. Look up vector and raster graphics on wikipedia, for a brief intro into it. In the end it's all raster graphics when it displays on the monitor, which is made up of tiny colored dots but, when there's a vector file and program to manipulate in this format, before it makes it to the monitor, there's possibility of stretching a vector without getting blocky looking output. Raster is like using tiny lego blocks of color to create any picture, if you try to scale it up, all those tiny blocks become bigger and it starts looking jaggy. Vector is instead composing a picture of simple parts like lines and circles. These primitives are always stored internally as codes, e.g. circle with center at 50,50 with radius 100. When you scale it up in a vector program it could become circle with center at 50,50 with radius 500. This will render smoothly.

Hi GC. I don't think you need to take any special courses if ou are willing to do some reading and experimenting. It's not a time issue because you can teach yourself much faster IMO than someone else can - if you are motivated and it sounds as if you are.

This forum has many very helpful people who will solve any problem for you - Just ask nicely and clearly, and don't go on about some other favorite program being so much easier to use and why don't we make Inkscape just like that program etc. etc. Anyway from reading your posts so far I don't think you have that particular tune in your repertoire ...

About Ghostscript. Inkscape probably still needs this additional program installed to be able to open EPS files. what OS is our computer running? If windows, read this, then download Ghostscript from somewhere and install it and then change your path variable so Inkscape can find it when it needs to. This may not be absolutely necessary, some eps files may open without doing this!

If you are designing for the web there is absolutely no reason that you need to get photoshop. GIMP is perfectly capable of everything you need, is very uptodate and has a very large and helpful user base. the only possible advantage that Photoshop and illustrator have over GIMP and Inkscape is when it comes to professional print applications, viz. CMYK separations.

There are a number of reasons you might not be able to select something. Best to point to the file so someone can download it and take a look. If that's not possible, always include in your description of a problem what it says in the statusbar (bottom of window) when you select something. Chances are it says 'One Group' at which point you will have a variety of options to select objects within a group. (Try control clicking to see if that selects a path!)

Edit: having downloaded the file you linked to I have found that Inkscape will not import the text as text, i.e. you can not edit the text. This is either because the font cannot be found or because this is the way the eps was saved originally. You will have to open the group (by double-clicking) and just select and delete the paths. You can then type your own text with the text tool. Sorry!

I hope this post has been informative and respectful without being boring and pedantic. Long-winded would also be bad ... whoops! Too late to do anything about that!

Chriswww,

Believe it or not, I actually followed what you were saying. Patting myself on the back again with a big ole grin. I was reading about Raster yesterday. Haven't gotten to Vector yet.

Thanks for taking the time to explain in such a way that even I can comprehend!!!

druban wrote: . . . - Just ask nicely and clearly . . .

Clearly? Well, you're gonna have to be patient with me, 'cause I'm not sure -- with my lack of proper terminology -- whether I'll be able to explain my issues in a way that y'all can understand. LOL. I'll get there eventually though.

druban wrote: GIMP is perfectly capable of everything you need

Actually, I downloaded GIMP a few months ago. I reckon I should go back to it and spend some time trying to figure it out. Thanks for the tip!

And thanks for the instructions regarding the text. Got to work on my logo this week, but hopefully I can tackle the text issue next week. So I'll probably be back, whining for more help.

Thread Drift: Regarding my logo, I have a question. I need to edit the font, but don't know how. Do I do that in GIMP? My webmaster can do this, but it will cost $500. Surely I can figure this out in order to save $500. The website will be "Troup County Living." I have the words "Troup County" above the word "Living." I want the "L" in "Living" to swoop over top of the words "Troup County." I don't have a CLUE as to how to do that. Just off the top of my head, I'm thinking that I save it as a photo, upload it to GIMP, and then somehow stretch the L and drag it around. Am I way off or fairly close? The webmaster is waiting on my logo, and needs it within a week. I don't want to give up and just send him what I have, because I just don't like the way it looks. I want to beef it up somehow. I don't like the font I'm using, either. Do you have a site that you recommend for downloading fonts? I sure wish that I could attach/upload my logo here. I don't see an option for that though. Am I just overlooking it?

EDITED TO ADD: Also, is there an option wherein I can select to receive e-mail notifications once a post has been made to a subscribed thread? I looked around but didn't see one. I may simply be overlooking it though.

Info on attaching files: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=11753

If you're using Windows, click on the file to highlight, then right-click > Extract. Or if you have 7-Zip (which is another popular file archive/compressor) it right-click > 7-Zip.

It's going to be tricky editing an EPS file with Inkscape. I can't open EPS file myself, so I can't give you detailed instructions. The status bar is the text that shows at the bottom of the window. It contains a wealth of info for you, as you work with Inkscape. With the Selection tool engaged, it will identify whatever is selected. It gives different info, depending on which tool is engaged. Basics - Help menu > Tutorials
Manual - Inkscape: Guide to a Vector Drawing Program
Inkscape Community - Inkscape FAQ - Gallery
Inkscape for Cutting Design

Brynn,

Oh, lots of juicy information!!! And thank you for the link to Inkscape's manual!!!!!

With raster graphics, as in in programs like Gimp or Paint or Photoshop, all you can do in terms of editing is put other pixels on top like a line or freehand etc. Those new drawing elements replace what was there before. Whatever new pixels you add or modify gets "baked" into the picture and as soon as you finish editing something it becomes a bunch of pixels no longer editable as an object (e.g. text, line, etc.) All you can really do is undo previous steps but not re-edit any text etc as soon as it's done. It just ends up as part of the bunch of pixels in the whole picture. Vector graphics are always re-editable. You can open a .svg file in inkscape and re-edit text or select any object and modify its size and color. If you start with a raster graphics picture, say the logo you mentioned, you would add your swooping line to join to the L. The line (or lines) will have to be appropriate thickness and color and carefully join it to the L whilst you can still edit it, before it gets "baked in" to the picture.
You might be able to do this also in Inkscape by importing the raster picture (it stays a raster element) and draw the lines on top to simulate visually a swooping letter L. The new vector lines will always sit atop the raster picture but visually it would be a continuous swooping L. Don't like your chances of stretching a raster graphics text letter L to form a swooping form.

From what you have said so far we can gather:
1. The logo is still in SVG form.
3. You don't like the font that you have used and you want to change it and then change the 'L' to swoop aroud the whole text.

Much better by a very long shot to do this in Inkscape! The GIMP knowhow to do this smoothly is quite complicated, even at web resolutions.
Upload your logo here to get more advice.
Also! Powerpoint.... not a great environment for graphic work. what can you do in PP that you can't do in Inkscape or the GIMP??

Also: The file you linked to as something you were trying to use "just for experimental purposes," is not a very well designed drawing, although to be fair some of its problems may well be from the import into inkscape. Be that as it may, there's nothing there that would not be much easier to make from scratch in inkscape than to fix after importing the file. ...just saying!

OH! Well I may have had some advanced info about the logo, via PM. He said he made it in Powerpoint, so I was assuming it's a raster. But I guess we don't really know for sure yet.

Off topic: First, thx to Druban for inlcuding the link on how to view an EPS file in Inkscape, per a post from a DavidH there, I was able to update my directory info and for the first time EVER, actually view an EPS file in Inkscape, yay. What a good feeling. I was using ghostscript and Ghostview to view my EPS files, wow! kudos! (turns out it was only a tiny matter of adding the version no. of GH to the path, the info was already in there). easy peasy.

GoofyChickens (luv that name BTW), I can't add any techinal info to help you, just want to encourage you to stick with it, and one miraculous day it will all come together and make sense. You shouldn't have to pay $500 for a web person to whip up a font/logo that you like. Basically, on the font, think of it like this, each and every letter of the font that you use most likely can be manipulated so that they each can be different sizes or different colors, the fill and stroke colors can all be different. Also, sometimes we separate the text, i.e., I would probably make the "L" an object all by itself, and make each word all by itself (then group them together later on). sometimes it's just easier to manipulate that way. There's also manual kerning. (Bottom line is to start thinking of items as individual objects that can be moved around on their own, so that will help you when creating a logo). Fonts start out as text, but, if you highlight it (and be sure to keep a duplicated copy on a hidden layer in case things go wrong), click on Path, Object to Path, then it changes the text to a path, and you can then move the nodes around, thereby changing it's essential shape. hang in there!

There's a whole lot of info in these posts, some of it will be over your head, don't worry, one day it will come together. Truthfully, I've been using Inkscape for a few yrs now, and still have so much more to learn, but you'll have enough to get your website up and running, and be able to come back in a yr and update it. I'm an 'oldie' too, that really doesn't matter, it a state of mind to 'stick with it', and 'keep on keepin' on' to get 'er done! lol. good luck