Working with lettering
Lettering in Comic Life covers two compositional elements: Titles and
Sound Effects. Comic titles frequently involve warped lettering (for
example the Superman logo) or interesting fills, outlining and shadows.
Comic sound effects (for example "POW", "ZAP", "BOING", etc) are always
warped and filled with color. Lettering elements let you accomplish
both with ease.
Adding lettering
To add lettering to a page drag a lettering element from the palette
and drop it at the appropriate location.
A sheet appears where you can type in the letters for the sound effect
and change the font and point size if necessary.
The initial font is set from the default lettering
stylesheet.
Click on "Convert to Graphics" to add the lettering to the page.
Sound effects are special in that they are not
handled as regular text. The text is converted to a graphic
representation that enables creative display capabilities such as
per-character gradient fills, merged drawing and warping - this is
described further below.
The lettering is displayed centered on the drop point with whatever
default style is in effect for lettering.
Note that the letters are organized such that if the
letters are closely packed the preceding letters overlap the following
letters in a natural hand-lettered style.
Editing lettering
If you would like to change the font or the text of lettering simply
double click on it and the lettering sheet will reappear so you can
adjust the text and font upon which the lettering is based. Once you
click the "OK" the new text is warped to fit the current lettering
outline. You can also simply select the lettering and press the Bigger or Smaller font text size icons in the toolbar.
If you have used any of the character adjustment
tools these changes will need to be reapplied.
Moving lettering
Simply click and drag the lettering to the appropriate location.
Resizing lettering
Resizing lettering is where the fun begins. Dragging the corner resive
handles warps the lettering to fit the new shape. You can add a lot of
drama to a sound effect by dragging out its top two corner handles.
To bend the lettering use the top and bottom center handles. These are
special handles that gently bend the letters so they curve to fill the
new space. These center handles retain their relative position between
their respective corner handles so that adjusting the corners does not
interfere with the curve that you've applied.
Scaling lettering
If you like the general shape of your lettering, but want to change
it's dimensions, then you need to use the rescaling handles. Click on
the text to select it, and once it is selected, click on the text
again. A box with a set of square green handles will appear, which you
can use to rescale your text. Holding down the Shift key when resizing constrains the dimensions, preventing accidental warping.
Rotating lettering
You can rotate a lettering element to any angle by selecting the
element and dragging the rotate handle around. Holding down shift locks
the angle to the nearest 90° angle.
Deleting lettering
To delete a lettering element simply select it and hit the Delete key
or choose Edit->Delete.
Lettering Details
The Lettering Details offers a few extended features for Lettering.
Horizontal Spread
Increases or decreases the horizontal space between the individual
letters in the lettering.
Note that this has little or no impact when the letters are aligned
vertically.
Vertical Spread
Increases or decreases the vertical space between the individual
letters in the lettering. Note that this has little or no impact when
the letters are aligned horizontally.
Skew
Skew lets you rotate the baseline of the lettering without rotating the
letters (for a stair-step effect) - providing a useful dynamism without
impacting legibility.
Stagger
The stagger buttons cause the individual letters to be alternately
shifted up and down or left and right. This gives the lettering a
jumbled effect for added impact. You can keep clicking either of the
buttons to increase the effect. Use Edit->Undo to revert back.
Join character outlines
Sometimes you'll want the characters to be displayed individually and
have the outlines of each overlap. Other times you'll want the letters
to be joined neatly together. Checking this option draws the lettering
as a single graphic object so that a gradient fill is draw across all
the letters, outlines are merged (where they overlap) and the shadow
(if any) is beneath all the characters.
Lock
Prevents the lettering from being moved or resized.
Clip
Normally lettering is trimmed where they intersect the edges of a
panel. Unchecking this option allows the sound effect to be drawn
outside the panel for dramatic effect.
Style properties
Use the Style popup menu to pick a different style, or simply
experiment until you create a style you like.
If you have made a variation to the selected style, then an asterisk
appears next to the style name. Your element is now unique!
If you want to share this new style, then create a New style.
New styles can be created
under Style Attributes with the '+ New' button - a sheet appears that
lets you
name the new style. When you click "OK" the new style is created and
the element is set to use the new style. Now you can set other elements
to have the same style.
You can also Update the
current style - be careful! - this will also change the
attributes of every other object (in this style).
The default style cannot be changed, so you will need to create a new
style, which you can then use on other elements.
If you don't like your changes, press the Revert button to go back
to the original style.
See Lettering Styles for more
information on each setting.