Translucent Text

Translucent text is not as simple as outlining or shadowing, but it's not particularly hard. A translucent image is just something partially invisible, or clear. This is done by drawing the image onto a buffer, editing the buffer, and then merging the buffer back onto the original image.

“translucent text” makes use of the built-in PHP functions imagesx( ), imagesy( ), imagecreate( ), imagesetpixel( ), imagecolorat( ), imagecolorsforindex( ), imagecolorallocate( ), imagecopy( ), imagettftext( ), imagecopymerge( ) and imagedestroy( ).

01 <?php
02 
03 function imagettftexttransparent(&$im,$size,$angle,$x,$y,&$col,$fontfile,$text,$pct)
04 {
05     // Get the image width
06     $im_w = imagesx($im);
07     // Get the image height
08     $im_h = imagesy($im);
09     // Create a buffer
10     $new = imagecreate($im_w,$im_h);
11     // Set a pixel down, so we can easily get the color
12     imagesetpixel($im,$im_w -1,0,$col);
13     // Get the color at that pixel
14     $index = imagecolorat($im,$im_w-1,0);
15     // Get the index of that color
16     $rgb = imagecolorsforindex($im,$index);
17     $r = $rgb['red'];    // Get the red value
18     $g = $rgb['green'];    // Get the green value
19     $b = $rgb['blue'];    // Get the blue value
20     // Allocate this color on the buffer
21     $color = imagecolorallocate($new,$r,$g,$b);
22     // Copy the old image onto the buffer
23     $copy = imagecopy($new,$im,0,0,0,0,$im_w,$im_h);
24     // Draw the text
25     $text = imagettftext($new,$size,$angle,$x,$y,$color,$fontfile,$text);
26     // Copy the buffer back onto the original image
27     $merge = imagecopymerge($im,$new,0,0,0,0,$im_w,$im_h,$pct);
28     // Destroy the buffer
29     imagedestroy($new);
30 }
31 ?>