Make a Photo Cutout from within Keynote
You probably want to have a quick look at how to do it and then get the details, So please, view the movie.

General Information
This technique works extremely well for flat or slightly beveled photo cutouts such those used in Global, Titanium 2 or Frames from KeynoteUser.com. The bevel can be enlarged through increasing the offset and blur in the inspector for such themes as Woodcut and Granite although in this case it will not be a perfect match with those custom cutout edges. In Desert theme, a wide bevel using black and light brown works best, but you won't be able to match the special grians-of-sand cutout edge found in the actual theme.

Having said that, this affords an easy but still very good looking way for the user to make round, oval, square, rectangle and triangular photo cutouts for themselves. For more variation select the object, holding down the command key, drag the corner control point and rotate it!

There is a small error in the movie I need to correct. The offset and blur needs to match so there is no overlap and one does not cancel the other. This did not show up on the oval but when I did a square, it did. Use 4 and 4 or 15 and 15, not 3 and 6.

The Nity Grity
When you bring in a Shape object to start, some themes have set a line on the Shape, you should remove it unless that is the look you want. In the case of a flat cutout you can use one Shape object with no line or shadow, it's even quicker!

As seen in the movie you have one Shape for the hi-lite edge and one that sits on top for shadow and containing the image. If both Shapes have the picture placed in them the pixels on the edge will pile up and give you a less smooth edge. So fill the one in the back with something that aproximates the overall backround color. The shadow color should be black or a very dark tone of the theme background. The hi-light color should be white or a light version of the background. Sometimes the opacity on the shadows looks best at 100% and other times 50%. In the Titanium 2 example it is set at 100% hi-light, 70% shadow. In Desert (above) it is 50% hi-lite and 100% shadow. It depends on the background and how they blend together, you want the shading to nicely fade in without being too obvious. It's always a good idea to step a few feet away from your display to have a look at the big picture.

When placing the image into the shape through the Inspector, make sure "Fill" is set to "Image Fill". You will note that in the movie we had to change the setting from "Tile" to Scale To Fill". Try a few different ones to get what you want. Unfortunately, there is no way to move the image within the Shape.

After you make some "cutouts" you can collect them in a .key file and have a library of them. In future just copy and paste into your presentation, ungroup and import your image. As most of you have already realized by now, you can lay these across two slides and do those great Push and Cube transitions.

We had a bit of a concern telling everyone about this. Some might decide they will never buy another theme! With further thought, not everyone likes to be handy, some want things as simple as possible. Plus, it will push us do more unique photo cutout shapes and edges that are imposible to reproduce with this technique. As an example, you can't get close to the upcoming Da Vinci cutout with this way (yes it will arrive one day).