Paste Inside with Fireworks MX

One of the many very cool features of Macromedia Fireworks MX is that it gives you the ability to place an image inside a shape, like this:

You’ve probably seen these images around the Web -- the effect is called “paste inside.”

Paste inside is a very neat little effect that you can use to spice your images up a bit, and give them a more professional appearance. You can paste any image you want into any shape you can create in Fireworks MX: ellipses, circles, rectangles, rounded rectangles -- anything!

In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to create images similar to the one below. Notice how the image appears to be inside of the shape. Let's learn how to create this very neat effect.

First, you’ll need an image. Below you’ll find the image I originally started with. You can download this image and use it for this tutorial if you wish, or you can use your own if you have an image you like handy.

Step 1

Launch Macromedia Fireworks MX, and create a new file by selecting FILE >> NEW.

Make the new Fireworks file 200x200 pixels with a white background.

Step 2

Now we will need to import the image we’ve decided to use into the new Fireworks file. Choose FILE >> IMPORT, and locate the image you want to use. Import it into the new Fireworks file (see below).



Once you've clicked the Import button, move your mouse over the blank fireworks file you created in step 2, and left click. The image you’re trying to import will appear in the blank fireworks file – it’ll look like this: