![]() ![]() Probably the biggest factor in typography for sizing is not only all fonts are different dimensions, but curved fonts are larger than flat, and then the word you are using makes a huge difference. The tip to ignore text size and just design to eye is good advice, just make it look good, convert to curves and it will give you the size of the overall decal to cut, sometime I adjust a touch to fit into the material I am cutting. I think it is more simple than you think, and working in inches is a smart way to work as most of your materials are measured that way.įirst off always design at full size, that is one of the advantages of Corel, and it makes for less mistakes down the road. I attached a cropped screen shot from Illustator 25.2 showing the drop-down menu listing the four sizing options. Now it's a lot easier in Adobe Illustrator with the Font Height Variations. Users would have to deploy all kinds of odd work-arounds just to size lettering in the crude approach I described with CorelDRAW. It's just another thing to muddy the waters worse. Funny thing: that box wouldn't be the same size as the Em box dimensions of the actual font file. In Adobe Illustrator both Point Text objects and Area Text objects would be surrounded by an Em box (or ICF box). It's a somewhat reliable way to get something like 10 inch tall letters that are accurately 10 inches tall (and positioned precisely too). In Corel it's at least possible to create dummy block letters like "E" as artistic text objects, then size and position them as needed. Hopefully that will be coming soon.Īctually, the font sizing issues were previously worse in Adobe Illustrator than they were in CorelDRAW. But they still need to add new alignment functions to make the most of the feature. Smart Guides react to those type features, snapping objects to baseline, x-height, cap-height, etc. You have to enable it in the Character palette. The Font Height Variations feature is not visible by default. Plus Illustrator supports way more type technologies than any existing sign making app (Extended OpenType features, OTF Variable Fonts, SVG Color Fonts). It's as good as the implementation in any dedicated sign making app. So far the feature works reasonably well. I also included screen shots from FontLab Studio to add to the explanation. I sent the Illustrator development team some image diagrams of how type is sized and positioned in sign design: according to cap height. I can personally take some credit for that feature being added. ![]() Script typefaces are common offenders, but they do that automatically reserve greater amounts of line spacing (especially if the script has prominent swash features).Īdobe Illustrator added a new feature called Font Height Variations with the AI 24.3 update last August. There are many typefaces whose letter tops fall well below the cap height line. It's just a matter of extrapolating the distance between the baseline and cap height line in relation to their positions in the Em Square. Some sign making applications try to size text by cap height in part by using the font's built in dimension numbers. ![]() That happens with lots of serif typefaces, display faces, scripts, etc. The approach starts to fall apart the more a typeface has features dipping below the baseline and rising above the cap line. That approach works best on sans serif typefaces like Helvetica or others that have at least some cap letters whose tops and bottoms match with the baseline and cap height line. Then I'll either type out the text using that letter or copy that dummy letter's values to another piece of artistic text and then baseline-align that text to the dummy letter's position. I'll position/align that letter where I want it. I'll size up a dummy letter such as "E" and then enter the desired size in inches within the Transformations palette. I use a work-around in the Transformations palette or the transforms values on the top tool bar. In CorelDRAW there is currently no sure-fire way how to set letter sizes based on cap letter height. So when you enter a value of 20" in the Text Properties box any graphics program will include that extra space in the em square and maybe even more space than that, depending on line spacing settings. Then there is often extra space above and below those lines (see the attached images). There are numerous horizontal guide lines built into those fonts (baseline, x-height, cap-height, ascender and descender). All digital typefaces are built within an imaginary box called an Em Square, aka "em size" or UPM size. ![]()
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