Apple LiveType 2 - Manual (Page 72)

72 Chapter 5 Working With Text
Creating a Matte
The matte feature in LiveType allows you to reveal a background element in the area
defined by a foreground element, seemingly cutting a hole through any layers in
between. When you create a matte, every pixel of the foreground element is replaced
by a corresponding pixel in the background element. In other words, a matte acts as a
window into another layer.
In LiveType, you have three options for creating mattes, available in the Matte pane of
the Attributes tab in the Inspector. The first option—Matte to Background—allows you
either to fill the foreground element with a background element, or to create an empty
window, which can remain transparent when you render your titling movie.
To create a matte with two project elements:
1 Create the background element by placing a texture, image, movie, or object as the
bottom layer reflected in the Timeline.
See Chapter 3, “ Adding a Background ,” on page 41 and Chapter 6, “ Working With
Objects, Textures, and Imported Elements ,” on page 79 for information about placing
these kinds of elements in the Canvas.
2 Make sure the background is beneath the background bar in the Timeline, and that no
other elements are below the background bar.
3 Create a texture or any other element that obscures the background.
4 Create a foreground element, that is, the text or object you want the background to “fill.”
5 With the foreground track selected, click the Matte button in the Attributes tab of
the Inspector.
Background texture Background bar