DJP Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 I am creating a one-page book cover (front, spine, back) in Publisher. I set up the document to the required size, created a layer and applied a color fill. Then I added a text frame with the book title etc. I'd like the color of the main layer to show through with just the black text in front. I assumed I could do this by making the background color of the text frame transparent, but I haven't been able to do this despite searching the documentation and this forum. Maybe I'm going out it wrong (I'm new to Publisher, although I have used InDesign previously). Can someone set me on the right track? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joachim_L Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 Have a look at the text frame panel. If not visible, make it visible via View -> Studio. DanM 1 Quote ------ Windows 10 | i5-8500 CPU | Intel UHD 630 Graphics | 32 GB RAM | Latest Retail and Beta versions of complete Affinity range installed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R C-R Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 If the text frame fill color is not already transparent: DanM 1 Quote All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7 Affinity Photo 1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJP Posted February 19, 2020 Author Share Posted February 19, 2020 Thank you both! I checked all the frames using the text frame panel and they are all transparent. I'm attaching a screen shot showing the layout of my document. The thumbnails also indicate that everything is transparent, except the background layer that has a fill. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joachim_L Posted February 19, 2020 Share Posted February 19, 2020 Could you post the file here? Quote ------ Windows 10 | i5-8500 CPU | Intel UHD 630 Graphics | 32 GB RAM | Latest Retail and Beta versions of complete Affinity range installed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lacerto Posted February 19, 2020 Share Posted February 19, 2020 (...) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJP Posted February 19, 2020 Author Share Posted February 19, 2020 I checked as Lagarto suggested; things seem OK. So here is the file. mod_clefs_cover_v1.afpub Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walt.farrell Posted February 19, 2020 Share Posted February 19, 2020 Your background does not have a fill. It's a Layer layer, which is simply shown as a filled folder icon in the layers panel. Its only purpose is to hold other objects, but it cannot have any content (e.g., fill) of its own. Try making a filled rectangle and having that as your bottom layer. Quote -- Walt Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases PC: Desktop: Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Laptop: Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU. iPad: iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard Mac: 2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lacerto Posted February 19, 2020 Share Posted February 19, 2020 (...) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff MEB Posted February 19, 2020 Staff Share Posted February 19, 2020 There's a few issues and discrepancies between how Mac and Windows versions display the thumbnails in the Layers panel. I'm also not sure why an empty layer is being represented with a folder icon on Windows. The attached document has no underlaying fill. The background layer is just an empty layer for organizational purposes only, with no objects or anything else inside as walt pointed out - it can't also be filled as if it was an empty pixel layer since as said this is just for holding/organizing objects. I'm checking these discrepancies/issues and will log them. Quote A Guide to Learning Affinity Software Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walt.farrell Posted February 19, 2020 Share Posted February 19, 2020 33 minutes ago, MEB said: I'm also not sure why an empty layer is being represented with a folder icon on Windows. That's consistent (on Windows) between Publisher and Designer. A (Layer) layer has the folder icon, presumably to represent its status as a container. How does it show up on Mac? Quote -- Walt Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases PC: Desktop: Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Laptop: Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU. iPad: iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard Mac: 2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJP Posted February 19, 2020 Author Share Posted February 19, 2020 Thanks, everyone. Now I see what I did wrong. I right-clicked on the background layer, chose Properties, and selected a color. Now I see that this only affects the little box on the thumbnail, not the actual content. I will add a rectangle to the background layer and fill it. In some programs (the photo editor I use, for instance) a layer can have a color of its own, which is probably what confused me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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