How to Remove a White Background from Your Logo

Lewis here for Pixel Surplus and today we're going to be learning how to remove a white background from a logo and export it as a transparent PNG.

This is a problem I run into all the time when working with clients. They only have one copy of that logo, it's a JPEG on a white background and it's really low resolution. So learning this method is going to save you loads of time. And cut out all the back and forth with the client.

The logo I’m using today is part of the Gallagher vintage serif font family.

This font family can be found at Pixel Surplus. There’s a demo version as well as the full version which includes Gallagher regular, rough, stamp, outline, and an illustrator file with 6 striking logos. The link to this font can be found in the description below along with the link to the Photoshop file that I’ll be using today so you can follow along at home.

So begin by opening up the Photoshop file that you’ve just downloaded. You should be greeted with the Winterfall Cafe & Bar logo on a white background. I've exported this image as a JPEG on a white background with very low contrast to make this as difficult as possible. If you can master this then a clean Vector logo with high contrast is going to be no problem at all for you.

With the method I'm about to show you I'm sure this won't be much of a challenge. So first let's begin by selecting the Winterfall logo in our layers panel. Next, we'll have to open the Channels panel so head to Window > Channels. With the Channels panel open, click through red green and blue until you find the channel that gives your logo the most contrast against the white background. 

If you're following along at home, we're going to select blue, but if you're performing this on your own logo choose the Channel that gives you the most contrast. 

Click and drag blue Channel down to the create new channel this will create a blue copy. This would be a good opportunity to zoom in to see the more intricate parts of the logo. You can zoom by using Control or Command +. Now head back to your channels panel and click on blue copy, hit Control L or Command L, this will bring up the levels panel. 

The goal is to get the logo completely black and the background pure white.

This is the result of the Voice Typing which needs to be edited and formatted

If you’re following along at home, I've gone for 190, 1.0, and 235. By bringing the white in from the right to about 235 it gets rid of that grey artifact thing around the logo. Just remember that if you're performing this on a different logo it's likely that your input levels will be different. Once you're happy with the levels click okay, head back to the channels panel, hold control and click blue copy, head to the layers panel, add layer mask, and finally let's invert that by hitting
Control I or command I.

FANTASTIC!

You should now see your logo on a transparent background. Head to the layers panel, create a new layer, place it below our logo, and fill that layer with black. As you can see, especially in the tree, our edges aren’t very clean and have a lot of white in them. But there is an easy fix. Head back to the layers panel, select the Winterfall logo, create a new layer, right click on that new layer, and hit create a clipping mask. Now anything that we do inside this layer will only affect the logo below it.

Next we need to open up the brush settings panel. So head to Window > Brush Settings. We’re gonna need a brush with 100% hardness. Hit B on your Keyboard, to access the brush, hold alt and click to sample the gold that is used for the P and the Tree. Now begin painting over the P and the Tree.

Remember you can change your brush size by using the open and close brackets [ ].

You don’t need to be neat when doing this because we are working inside a clipping mask. Just make sure to keep the correct color with the right element of the logo. Once you fixed all the gold components, sample the color you used for the text and do the same. Finally, head to the layers panel, and turn off the visibility for our background color.

Select both our logo layer, and clipping mask layer by holding shift, and Hit Ctrl+E or Command+E to merge them into one layer.

AWESOME!

You’ve come from a white background to a transparent background without losing any of the logo’s detail. And to save this file as a transparent PNG, head to File > Export > Export as. And make sure the format is PNG and transparency has been selected. Finally, hit Export. 

You are now able to place this logo on top of colored backgrounds, photography, and even product mockups.