How to make a knockout outline that cuts through

What it is

A knockout outline is a stroke that does not paint anything. Instead of a coloured line around the letters, it cuts a gap through everything underneath — the photo, the colour blocks, the pattern — so you see straight through to the background. The letters seem to be cut out of the page with a little air around them.

It solves an old problem: text on a busy photo. A normal outline adds another colour that has to work with the picture; a knockout adds space. The letters get separated from the image by the background colour itself, which always matches the layout, and the result looks like print or a die-cut sticker rather than a filter.

Where it is used

Knockout outlines are a staple of editorial covers, sports and event posters, sticker and badge designs, and bold social posts where a headline overlaps a cut-out figure. They also do the job of a drop shadow when type crosses several colours: one gap, one background colour, perfectly clean on every part of the picture.

Made in Paletoo with this mix:

How to make it, step by step

1. Open your design and select the text that crosses a photo or other layers. Bold display type gives the gap room to read.

2. In the Design tab, go to the Stroke section and press Add a stroke.

   

3. Press the knockout button in that stroke’s row (its tip reads Cut through the layers below). The stroke stops painting a colour: it now cuts a gap through every layer under the text, down to the background.

   

4. Set the gap with Width. To cut only the layers right under the text instead of all of them, choose how many layers it reaches in the same row — All layers is the default.

   

5. Change the words or the font at any time: the gap follows the letters exactly, and it stays live when the text is moved over a different part of the photo.

6. Press Export. In PNG and PDF the gap shows the background exactly as on the canvas.

Watch it

Make it your own

The background decides the colour of the gap. A dark background gives a dark band, a white one a white band; if you want the gap in another colour, change the artboard background or put a solid colour layer right under the photo and set the knockout to reach only the layers above it.

Keep the gap in proportion to the letters: around 3–5 % of the type size reads as a clean separation; much wider starts to look like a separate outline shape. Thin type needs a thinner gap, or the counters close up.

Combine it with a normal stroke for a sticker look: one knockout stroke for the gap and a second, coloured stroke outside it. Each stroke has its own row, so you can stack them in any order.

More effects

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