This is a simple hippie-style web to print text effect with outer contours. Create a “far out” template by following a few simple steps.

Before you start

• Add a page frame (Layout/Page Setup/Add Page Frame). This will create a rectangular shape with the exact same size as the paper size of your template and place it as a bottom layer.
• Create one artistic text frame and turn it into a variable web-to-print field called Text.

Fonts

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For this technique we need one of those “sixties” fonts that were popular in hippie psychedelic designs. Download the BellBottom Laser font or any other font you think will do the trick.

Note. Check out our font resources for more free fonts for your web to print designs.

Contour

Select the dummy text and activate CorelDRAW’s Contour tool from the toolbox menu on the left.

Use these settings as reference.

• Click on the Outside icon to generate an outer contour;
• We used 5 contour steps in this example;
• The Contour Offset is the thickness value of each step;
• Use Linear contour;
• The Fill color is the color that the contour ends up with at its edge while the color of the object it self is the starting color.

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The result should be similar to this.

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To make the text more readable we need to set a different color to it. Changing the color of the dummy text will effect the contour color and we don’t want that.

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To avoid this, you need to duplicate the dummy text without the contour group (Ctrl+C/Ctrl+V), place the copy on top and change its color.

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Note. To select an object without its contour group, click inside the object and make sure that only the object is selected inside the Object Manager (Window/Dockers/Object Manager).

Complex contour

You can make a more complex contour effect by adding an outline to the text. The outline can also be blended into steps just like the contour steps.

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The color of the outline you choose in the Object Properties docker (Alt+Enter) is the starting color.

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The Outline color in the top countour settings bar is the end color.

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This way the contour arround the dummy text is more complex since it has 5 blended contour steps as well as 6 blended outlines between each of those steps.

Final touches

To give the template a bit more flare in the same vibe as the dummy text, you can PowerClip some random shapes inside the background shape and use similar contours on them.

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The result should be similar to this.

All done!

Our web-to-print software can handle this effect easily! Upload the template into your catalog and test it.

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Try this web-to-print template.

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Download the FREE CorelDRAW template file.

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