Updating text layers

[igstan]

Hi,

Is it currently possible to update text layers in a PSD file? I have some sort of PSD template with a placeholder text layer, and I'd like to dynamically provide values for that layer and then generate a set of images. Is this possible with psd-tools?

[kmike]

Hi @igstan,

No, unfortunately it is not possible currently. The following is missing:

1. there is no support for psd writing - currently psd-tools can only read psd files;
2. layer composition utilities are quite basic (only alpha composition is supported), so if we start modifying layers and writing PSD files combined image could be incorrect;
3. font data is not parsed for text layers (only text itself is extracted) - this part of PSD format is not documented by Adobe; there is an external implementation for that though (see https://github.com/codercarl/py-psd-engineData), and something like that will eventually become a builtin feature;
4. font rendering is not implemented - for text layers psd-tools gets images from pre-rendered bitmaps stored in psd file; even if we start parsing font data, modifying images will require re-implementing parts of Photoshop text rendering engine.

I think that if we improve (1) and maybe (2) then what you want to do can be approximated without implementing (4) and (4): you can render the text using PIL. Nothing prevents implementation of (1) - even if psd-tools doesn't know how to parse some data, binary blobs are not discarded, but nobody is working on this feature AFAIK.

[ihrankouski]

Hello. Did anything changed?

[kmike]

Hey @ihrankouski!

1. nothing changed;
2. there is a PR with a much more advanced layer composition: Blend modes support for merging #49; it is not merged and requires some work;
3. as I recall, parsing is improved, so it should be easier to get font information now;
4. nothing changed.

[mediaotg]

Hello. Did anything change?

[kyamagu]

Editing text is very difficult. Perhaps requires freetype or equivalent.

[yooooyooo]

Hello. Did anything change and what are the difficulties? What should I do if I try to implement this feature? @kyamagu @kmike

[kroomz]

Is text layer editing still not possible with psd-tools?

[HitobitoArnold]

If editing text, some other part of data should also be modified.
Still have no idea which parts should be changed, and how to modify them. :((

[sokoloveav]

Hello! Still no updates on editing text layer with psd-tools?