Fonts and Text.

[timetobegin]

SO I'm kinda not that great at text, so i figured that makes me the perfect person to post about this (lol)



1. Mix it up I'm a huge fan of complimentary and contrasting colours. I think it adds a little something more to the icon. It also manages to separate the text out, and if the text is quite close together or your icon has multiple colours you can add text without having parts of it lost in the background. I quite often use the colour picker to choose my colours from within the icon. I also think its great to mix fonts as well! The last thing i love to mix up is hard and soft - a severe blocky font with a more curved script can look AWESOME. Remember to rotate text if you want to get it just so.




2. Small & Spaced out I'm a big fan of small text, readable or unreadable. Choose different fonts and if it doesn't look quite right try spreading the letters out a little further.



3. Add stuff I'm a hugeeee fan of drop shadow which you can see here, it helps define the text as well as getting more colours in there. I also sometimes add a line under my text to make it look right. I dunno why. Just do!





4. Know your text tools! This is in photoshop so i'm not 100% sure if it matches up with Gimp or PSP, but still. I really love the vertical alignment (VA) tool in particular. Also i never use the caps button - i always use the all caps setting so i can change it later if needed.



5. FONTS & Fontspiration!

I love the following fonts: bebas neue, ben brown, book jacket, brain flower, Christmas gift, fely, Intro, jellyka fonts, La points Road, Pacifico, Roadway. A couple of years ago i made a list of my fave fonts here it is

Here are 10 icons with fonts i love :


by : daynawashere, erszebet, nyaza, phaust_, neversleeps

by : longerthanwedo, iulieki, wickedgrdn, fassy, endearest

And finally, here are some other tutorials to check out :
- text guide by letsey-x
- font guide by wickedgrdn
- a guide to text by absolutelybatty & the updated version
- text guide by calrissian18
- text tutorial by neversleeps

and if you're looking for more here is a tutorial masterpost

Comments

[frayadjacent]

This is great, thank you! And you have some awesome fonts. Also: you are great at type; don't say you aren't. :P

[timetobegin]

awww hope it helps!

[goodbyebird]

Yes, excellent! I really do need to start pushing my font game. In the beginning, before I decided to stop ruining my icons with text, I used to be such a smartass.

[timetobegin]

I am such a wuss and never use it. Its not so much fonts, its more knowing what to say

[ghanimasun]

This is really useful. Thanks for sharing it!

I have been always wanting to do more interesting stuff with fonts and I was unconsciously doing some of the stuff you mentioned not to do. So I shall try to branch out some. And new fonts are always fun!

[timetobegin]

awww i don't think there is anything you can do wrong with fonts. But i always look at some icons and just go HOWWWW

[skieswideopen]

*busy stealing all Tash's fonts*

This is so good! Also useful for sig tags.

[timetobegin]

:) yesss sig tags are so easy if you have lots of good font!