Picture's background color doesn't match background when printed

[Impecunious]

Hi,

I've got two logos in Publisher that won't cooperate.

There's a colored rectangle that I've pasted these logos on top of, but
prior to inserting them, I recolored the backgrounds of the logos in MS
Paint to match the RGB codes of the rectangle's color. On screen,
these logos blend perfectly into the rectangle's color fill.
Unfortunately, if I print the page, the background of the logos is
distinctly obvious, and they no longer blend in with the rectangle. In
other words, a rectangular perimeter is clearly "drawn" around the
logos, exactly like their dimensions. I can save this document as an
Adobe PDF but the same problem happens.

If it matters, I'm using a black-and-white printer. Any thoughts?
Thanks in advance.

 

[Mary Sauer]

Maybe you can match the colors within Publisher, it could help.
http://www.nattyware.com/pixie.html

Pixie is a color picker, small utility, free.

 

[Impecunious]

I think I've essentially done that already. I assigned the RGB codes
of my filled rectangle's color in Publisher to the fill color of my
logos in MS Paint before I inserted them. Again, on screen the logos
fit perfectly in with the Publisher objects.

I'm curious whether maybe the type of picture I chose when I inserted
the pictures is the issue. These picture objects weren't created in
Publisher, so maybe that's why their frames and a different color show
up on the printed page.

 

[Mary Sauer]

What I am saying, bring the logo into Publisher, open the color picker, is the
rectangle showing the same RGB fill as the logo?
It very well could be the colors are not matching in the Publisher program.

One reason the colors are not matching could be because the rectangle is a
vector, the logo is not. You may have better success by copying the rectangle,
copy, paste special as a bitmap.

 

[Ed Bennett]

I'm curious whether maybe the type of picture I chose when I inserted
the pictures is the issue. These picture objects weren't created in
Publisher, so maybe that's why their frames and a different color show
up on the printed page.

I think it's more the case that the printer driver is handling drawn
Publisher objects and raster image data differently.

A solution would be to make the logo transparent, rather than simply
matching the background colour. The best way to do that would be to use
a vector version.

 

[Impecunious]

Mary and Ed, thanks for your replies.

A solution would be to make the logo transparent, rather than simply
matching the background colour. The best way to do that would be to use
a vector version.

How do I use a vector version? I'm not sure I follow you, but I
obviously don't want my entire logo picture to be transparent - just
the background space around the logo.

Thanks,
Shaun

 

[Mary Sauer]

Can you save the logo as .png? It supports transparency as well as .gif. Do you
only have the raster image? Did you create the logo in a draw program? You can
try the transparency tool in Publisher. It is on the picture toolbar right of
the dog icon.

 

[Impecunious]

Thanks Mary. Because the fill color around the logos was set to the
color of my Publisher's rectangle fill, there's no fill color in the
picture object once I insert it to Publisher. That is, the
transparency option under Format Picture is disabled. Have I missed
something?

 

[Mary Sauer]

The transparency tool is not in the format dialogue. It is on the picture
toolbar.
Go here, the right column, scroll down
http://msauer.mvps.org/microsoft_publisher_menus.htm

 

[Impecunious]

The Set Transparent Color on the Picture toolbar did the trick. I
must've misundestood your previous post.

Thanks for your help, Mary!

 

[Mary Sauer]

You are very welcome. Thanks for posting back, I appreciate it.