One of the most common text effects you will see in everyday media is wrapped text. This effect alters the positioning of your text to outline a specific shape or image perfectly. At first glance, you might think that it takes a bunch of manual text alignment to wrap text in Photoshop. In reality, you can create this effect with just a few simple paths and your Text Tool!
Since there are a few different ways you can wrap text in Photoshop, this post will share each of these methods. The first will be to wrap text around the outside of a shape, the second will wrap text around the edge of a shape, and the last method will wrap text to the inside of a shape. Let’s get started!
Video Tutorial
1. How To Wrap Text Around Shapes And Images In Photoshop
In this first method, we will make the text go around the outside of a shape. This text wrap effect is commonly seen in magazines or even your high school yearbook (if you remember those). It makes your text wrap around the outside of your shape, creating an outline of your subject and uniformly shapes the text.
– Wrapping Text Around A Shape Or Object
The first thing you need to do is create a path around your shape. The fastest way to do this is by using the Pen Tool.
Press P to access your Pen Tool or find it in your toolbar.
Now begin creating an outline of your shape or object you want the text to wrap around. In this case, I’ll create an outline of the person.
Click to add new anchor points with the Pen Tool and drag out to curve your pen path. If you’re not already familiar with this tool, be sure to read our guide to using the Pen Tool in Photoshop.
This outline doesn’t need to be perfect. Just a general shape to match the outline of the object will do!
Once you’ve finished creating an outline, you need to make a box for the rest of your text to fit in. To help yourself create an evenly shaped text box, use guides to help you out.
Access your ruler by pressing Command + R (Mac) or Control + R (PC). Click on the ruler (either the horizontal or vertical one) and drag out. A new moveable guide will be created to position over your image.
Place a vertical and horizontal guide to help outline where you want your text box to go.
Once the guides are in place, continue along with your Pen Tool tracing the guides you just created. This makes it much easier to create a uniform box for your text.
Continue and connect your pen path back to the starting anchor point.
With the pen path complete, grab your Text Tool by pressing T.
Hover over the inside of your path and notice how your text icon changes to a cursor with a circle. Click inside of the path to begin writing text.
Now your text will be confined to the edges of your path and wrap around the edges of your shape. This is one of the best ways to wrap text in Photoshop.
The Result
For example’s sake, I pasted placeholding text to give you an idea of what a paragraph would look like. You can edit this wrapped text at any time just by clicking on your text with the Text Tool.
2. How To Wrap Text Along The Edge Of A Shape
The second way you can wrap text in Photoshop is by wrapping it along the edge of a shape. Rather than lines of text fitting around a shape, this method shapes the text to the shape’s edge.
This text wrap method is best for shorter sentences and won’t work well for paragraphs. Regardless, it’s another useful way to consider. You can wrap text along the edge of a shape using the Shape Tool or by creating your own path. Let’s go over each option individually as they differ very slightly.
– Wrapping Text Around A Pre-Made Shape
This first method will utilize the shape tool to create a pre-made shape. There are a ton of different shape options within Photoshop that can be used for this. To see all the available shapes, click and hold on the Shape Tool icon.
If you’re looking for something more unique, use the custom shape tool to explore further options. For this example, I’ll use the Ellipse Tool to create a circle.
Before you draw the shape, decide whether or not you want the shape to be visible alongside the text. If you want to see the shape with your text, select the shape option. If you’d rather the shape be invisible and just wrap the text, choose the path option. Below are examples of each to help you decide.
Once you’ve decided on how you want this wrap effect to look, click, and drag on your canvas to create the shape.
Next, grab your Text Tool by pressing T and hover your cursor over the line of your shapes path. Notice how the cursor now has a squiggly line through it. When you see this cursor, click on the shape’s edge.
Now your text will wrap itself to the outside edge of the shape.
The Result
This method is excellent if you already have a specific shape you want to wrap your text to. Since you’re using the Shape Tool, it takes minimal effort to create the path and begin writing your wrapped text!
– Wrapping Text Around A Custom Shape
Now let’s discuss how to wrap your text to the edge of a custom made shape. This method has much more versatility since you don’t need to have a finished shape. All you need is some sort of line to get started. To prove this, I’ll create a wavy line for this example.
To make a custom shape, you need to create a path. The best way to do this is with the Pen Tool.
Access your Pen Tool by pressing P or find it in your toolbar.
Click anywhere on your canvas to add an anchor point and begin creating a path. Since I want to create a wavy line, I will click and drag between each anchor point to curve my path.
Once you’ve created the shape you want, grab your Text Tool by pressing T.
Hover over your path until you see the cursor icon with the squiggly line. Click on the path to begin typing your wrapped text.
Your text will now wrap around the edge of the custom shape you just created!
The Result
This is another excellent way to wrap text around an edge using any shape you can imagine! Rather than being stuck to the preset options within Photoshop, you can get creative and make your own shapes! The Pen Tool is easily the most versatile tool for this job and makes custom path creation very straightforward.
– How To Wrap Text Around The Inside Edge Of Your Shape
Regardless of which above method you used, you may want to have your text wrap around the inside edge of your shape. This can be done in just a couple of clicks.
With your Text Tool, select your text and press Command + A (Mac) or Control + A (PC) to highlight all.
Hold Command or Control and click and drag your text to the inside of your shape. This will automatically shift your text to wrap around the inside edge of your shape.
3. How To Wrap Text To The Inside Of A Shape In Photoshop
The third way you can wrap text in Photoshop is by placing the entire body of text within a shape. This method is one of the easiest ways to wrap text and doesn’t require much manual effort.
To start, create the shape you want your text to fit inside. Once again, use your Shape Tool (U) for this step.
Before you create the shape, decide whether or not you want to have the shape visible or transparent for the final effect. To have your text wrap to a transparent shape, select the path option. If you want the text to have a colored background, select the shape option. Below are two examples of each.
Next, create the shape on your canvas. If you have a lot of text, make sure your shape is a little larger!
Grab your Text Tool by pressing T or accessing it in your toolbar.
Hover over the inside of your shape and click to add text. Your text will now be bound to the inside of your shape.
The Result
Wrapping text to the inside of a shape is another excellent text wrap method in Photoshop. This option is one of the quicker ways to wrap text and requires little to no technical skill. Just using the Shape Tool and the Text Tool, you can achieve this effect in under a minute!
Conclusion
Learning how to wrap text in Photoshop is a ton of fun, and the results are incredibly satisfying. Depending on the look you are going for, there are a few different ways you can create this effect. This tutorial shared the three best ways to wrap text to offer a wide array of choices to fit any situation. Now that you know how to wrap text in Photoshop, your options are limitless for creative text effects!
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– Brendan 🙂
