American flag inside country map outline
May 23, 2008 – 3:55 pm
A while ago I did an article explaining how to create a country’s flag inside its map outline and I used as an example the Australian map and flag. I’ve since had a lot of interest from Australians who wanted to use the image so I thought I’d do one for Americans as I get a lot of visitors from the United States.
I employed a very similar technique for this one as I did the other one. First, I got from a Google image search the country outline of the USA and a picture of the stars and stripes. I turned the country outline into vector form by using Adobe Illustrator’s Live Trace. The flag I re-created manually in Illustrator.
Once the flag was finished, I grouped all the objects and position the country map outline over the flag and, with both selected, I went Object > Clipping Mask > Make (Cmd/Ctrl-7) to give the flag the outline of the country.
I then copied this and pasted it into a Photoshop document and added a Bevel and Emboss and a slight Drop Shadow layer style.
14 Responses to “American flag inside country map outline”
Lovely image.
I like the shading. It looks very patriotic.
I may design a similar one for the UK.
By Article Rewriter on May 23, 2008
Fantastic job but not easy for a newbie like me. Although you have given details but it is still not possible to create that.
By Qaswer on May 25, 2008
Thank you Article Rewriter and Qaswer. Qaswer, do you have Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator? Did you follow the links to earlier tutorials I’d written? Let me know exactly where the problem is.
By Rob Cubbon on May 26, 2008
Nice trick
Photoshop is such a powerful tool, isn’t it?
By Roll top desk on May 29, 2008
Wow, I like it!!! Cool…
By GolDenOne on Jun 7, 2008
Very cool image, I find live trace very difficult - vector magic is a good bitmap to vector tool also, but you have to pay for a subscription. Cool image though man, good work.
By Free Vector Clip Art on Jun 9, 2008
I like the little shadow around the US. It makes it pop more. Good Work!
By dshot on Jun 10, 2008
Thank you, Roll top desk, GolDenOne, Free Vector Clip Art and dshot for your comments and support.
By Rob Cubbon on Jun 11, 2008
Wow , Very nice image
By Rama kanth on Jun 14, 2008
I have Adobe CS2 and I think that I can do this with that. Truly I visit many other photoshop blogs but I haven’t seen such stuff anywhere else.
By Safety Protection Technology on Jun 30, 2008
Thank you Rama kanth and Safety Protection Technology. You can definitely do this with CS2.
By Rob Cubbon on Jul 1, 2008
I wish I was able to do these kind of graphics myself. I’m always in awe at people who can. It looks so real to me. How long did this take to make anyway?
By Victoria on Sep 17, 2008
Hello Victoria. If you have the relevant software just follow the instructions and you’ll be creating this sort of graphic easily. It didn’t take me long, less than half an hour.
By Rob Cubbon on Sep 17, 2008
Good Layout and Design. I like your blog. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. .
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