Wrought iron decorative gate

HelenAA · February 13

Hi, I'm looking for a decorative gate for a future project - one of my Narnia set, actually - and I have found one or two possibles on Google/DuckDuckGo, but am loath to use them in terms of copyright and the fact that I can't clear all the background white pixels inside the gate doesn't help!

I've got big gates in Perspectives but they're solid, so I'm open to suggestions!! My Mac can clear white from the outside of the image as in the image below (swiped from the internet) but it doesn't do inside the black lines and is a bit messy around the outside.

massive-ornate-cast-iron-drive-gates_33243_pic1_size1-2998188115.png

Quenten · February 13

Are you sure these kind of designs have copyright? Alternatively, see if you can take a photo of a real gate in your district, and get rid of the intervening color - i use Photoshop for this.

Quenten · February 13

If you send me a non-copyright pic, I will get rid of the white for you and send it back.

KertDawg · February 13

(edited step 4)

GIMP can select areas by color. You can select all white pixels on the image with one click. Maybe use a little tolerance to include your preferred shade of gray in the borders between white and black so it's not rough around the edges; it's a visible setting. Then add a layer mask based on that selection. White will then be transparent. You can save that as a PNG or put whatever color you want behind it with a fill of a other layer behind it.

Short answer:

1. GIMP

2. Select by color, click any white pixel

3. Menu: Layer, Mask, Add Layer Mask

4. Pick "selection" and check "invert selection" at the bottom.

Done!

HelenAA · February 13

Extremely annoyingly I can't find the image in my Opening Post (OP) in any search. I'd feel safer if I knew it was Creative Commons / Free to Share and Use / Public Domain. Its from an english salvage company, but I cannot, for the life of me, work out from this page whether they have any 'ownership' of the image. I doubt it, and also, given that it would only be used for a map and shared on this forum, is it worth me worrying myself daft over it?