Is the shape vector or raster?

raster

The problem with using a blending mode is that to change the color of the background to white the text would need to be white, or close to it, to begin with.

You could try drawing a path to match the edges of your shape, converting the text to an outline, copying the text on top of itself, and using the pathfinder to intersect the shape and the text...but then you will have letters that change color around the edges of the shape. You might also end up needing Illustrator to pull that off.

I really think that your best option is just to do this manually. When I run into stuff like this I just remind myself how long it would have taken to do back in the days on paste-ups.

I’d outline the shape with the pen tool, convert the text to outlines, and make a copy of the “text” (which is now a vector graphic). Paste the text copy on top of the original text and use the align tools to make sure they are matched up exactly. Change the color of the text copy to the color you want to be inside the shape. Edit>Cut the copy and Edit>Paste into the outline of the shape that you made with the pen tool. If this is confusing see clipping paths under In-Design help. Depending on the complexity of the shape and the resolution of the image this should be a pretty successful solution. If this is going to be sent to a printer do NOT use blending techniques. They’ll screw ya every time. Plus, if you’re just getting started you need to know how to use clipping paths and masks because you’ll be using them a lot. Good luck.

sweeet. thx a lot that make a lot of sense. thank you, i will be printing this in my class room. will printers screw up blending techniques even if it was turned in as a PDF file?

Well... probably not, but don’t use blending techniques unless you have to. You’re relying on screen color to determine your finished product (unless you take it into photoshop and blend it and determine the actual CMYK results of your blending) and it’s not the way a professional would handle the situaltion (most likely). My students would definitely earn brownie points for using a clipping path, and I’d probably launch into a long-winded lecture about not using transparency and blending unless absolutely necessary. But I don’t think your grade would suffer (as long as it’s visually appealing). And be sure to print it on your home printer because some colors may look vastly different on your screen than they do printed out, and even though your home printer may not give you exactly the same results that your classroom printer will, it should still give you a serious heads-up if you’ve landed on a color that doesn’t translate well. I’m not sure what your InDesign color profile is, how close it is to your actual printer and screen settings or how well your screen is calibrated, but suffice to say there’s a reasonably good chance that what you’re seeing on your screen is not even close to what you’ll get from your classroom’s digital printer.

BTW, if you created the original shape in Photoshop and you have a mask of the outline already stored in the Photoshop file, or if the shape is high resolution with a very distinct outline that could be easily selected in Photoshop and converted to a mask, then you can choose to import the file into InDesign with the mask designated as a clipping path and use that instead of tracing it with the pen tool. That info can be found in InDesign help under “bitmap import options.” I’d be a wee bit leery of the “detect edges” method of creating a clipping path, but that’s a quick and easy method and may be worth a shot.

thank you sir!! i was successful and achieving the look i wanted. it work great. and it looks great.. thank you so much.