Translucent text?

[Anon]

Hey guys,

I have a job in which I'm supposed to allow users to look at full sized pictures and buy them if they want to. Of course, there would be no incentive to buy them if they can just download it there. So, we devised a protection method where the image is called through a PHP script and the PHP script adds a watermark or "SAMPLE" in large letters. My problem is this:

I want the letters or watermark to be translucent. So far, I haven't figured out a way to do this. Could I make the watermark one image, and the picture another image, and somehow layer the two?

Thanks for your help

[[deleted]]

i have no clue how to make a text translucent by modifiing it with php, BUT i would like to say something to your last idea ( "Could I make the watermark one image, and the picture another image, and somehow layer the two? " ...)

It is possible with divs which you could use as 'layers' and put them over the images. But 2 things you have to keep in mind:

• everytime a image is there you have to generate die postion (in px) where the layer hase to be. (if they are not on the same spot every time.) but this problem could be handled

now the biggest problem which makes your way unlogic:

if you make a layer "on" very image, someone who want this pic just looks into the sourcecode and finds the url to the image and can download it with the browser accessing that img directly or with a downloadmanager or any type of program whcih fullfills such actions ... so the best way would be the translucent text with php ... but i doubt wheater php is able to do this.

regards

ali

PS: please drob a little mail, if you got that translicent thing working 🙂

[siwis]

You'll need either the GD libraries or imagemagick.

Either can be controlled via php to achieve what you want, although I haven't done it so can't offer any advce on the actual doing!

[Anon]

Very possible with php and gd, but gd can be demanding on the system with hundreds of pageviews. Maybe you could first process all of the pics and save them. Email me if you want me to write this for you.