How to Convert Text to Outline in Photoshop

Text can be converted to an outline in Adobe Photoshop in only a few steps. You can use the "Convert to Shape" command in Photoshop to convert text to shapes. From there, you can delete the path control points until you have only the outline of the text. Keep reading to find out how you can convert your text to an outline in Photoshop.

Things You'll Need

• Adobe Photoshop CS3

Instructions

1. Start Adobe Photoshop and open an existing document that contains text you would like to convert to an outline. You can also start a new canvas and use the Text tool from the Photoshop toolbox to add text to the canvas.

2. Click on the layer in the Layers Palette that contains the text. The text must be placed on a layer and not on the background.

3. Choose the "Layer" menu, point to "Type" and click on "Convert to Shape" to convert the text to a shape.

4. Select the "Paths" palette and click to select the text vector mask that has now been created. The Paths palette is in the same palette as the "Layers" palette; just click on the "Paths" tab.

5. Choose the Pen tool from the Photoshop toolbox. Hold down the CTRL key on your keyboard and click to select the path control points that you want to delete from the text.

6. Press the delete key on your keyboard to delete the selected control points. Keep repeating this process until you have created an outline from the text.

Tips & Warnings

• You can start a new canvas in Photoshop by choosing the "File" menu and clicking "New" to open the "New" dialog box. Choose the settings you would like to have including size and background color and click the "OK" button create the new canvas.