Outline on text

[guiprepress]

If I have variable text that is light blue and I want to add a black outline to it, can I do this?

[Alex Marshall]

In FusionPro versions 5 and 6, there is a text effects tool selectable from the text frame properties palette that can help you achieve this.

Also, if you are using an older version. you can simply draw two text frames,altering their positions and adjust to achieve the desired effect.

[rpaterick]

In FusionPro versions 5 and 6, there is a text effects tool selectable from the text frame properties palette that can help you achieve this.

Also, if you are using an older version. you can simply draw two text frames,altering their positions and adjust to achieve the desired effect.

 

Alex, how do you add a stroke outline to variable text in 6.1?

Thanks

[Alex Marshall]

You want the character stroke a different color than the fill?. I can not think of an easy way to do this with FusionPro as we do not have a feature to do this.

A hard way, would be to take each character of the alphabet, change and change the stroke color, export as separate pieces of vector art.

This can be done in Adobe Illustrator or by programming. Then the problem here will be calculating the distance between each graphic (character) with the correct kerning pair. It's not easy, but worth a try.

[esmith]

If I have variable text that is light blue and I want to add a black outline to it, can I do this?

There is no way within FP to add strokes to variable type. I can not speak for DirectSmile capabilities in the latest release. (I think Alex thought you were asking about adding a black drop shadow rather than a stroke...)

[DSweet]

Not had the change to try this as we are still in the process of testing our templates before we make the full plunge into FP 6.1; but, if the drop shadow color can be made into a different color other than the text, has anyone every tried to make a drop shadow that has no vertical or horizontal shift, increase the spread a bit and leave the "shadow" effect at 100% solid?

 

In theory if you are using light blue text and the "drop shadow" is slightly bigger (increased spread) than the text AND is 100% black without any adjustment shift, this might give you a bit of an "outlined effect". Again just in theory of course.

 

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[LesSjo]

In theory, that would work if FP had the capability of using a "color" for the shadow. Presently, you can only use black or an opacity of black. I had thought to use it as a glow, but FP had other ideas...

[DSweet]

I thought as much for the color feature; but for the situation that guiprepress described, it just might work. I don't know how "solid" the drop shadow could be made into or even if the 0 vert. and horiz. are even possible. It was just a half-baked suggestion for this unique situation.

 

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[LesSjo]

I was able to create a faux glow on one project I worked on, but the processing time was horrendous.

[PaulIn2digital]

Are there any plans for this feature to be added to FP in future releases..? I have a job just come in where this has been requested along with 80% width reduction... looks like I'll have to revert to doing the merge in Indesign

[mhilger]

Hello Paul,

 

In fact, we are currently looking at stroke on text as an upcoming enhancement. We do have a number of other commitments that we have to meet in our 2010 delivery schedule but I can say that this is certainly one of those enhancements that is in the top 10 of what we are looking at implementing.

 

As soon as we have more info on availability, we'll let everyone know.

 

Thanks.

[PaulIn2digital]

Cool, I await with anticipation

[Stack]

5+ years later... Any chance this has been implemented and I'm just missing it?

[David Miller]

Take a look at the Advanced Text Effects button to the right of the Overflow button on the Text Frame Palette.

 

It was added in v8.1 on August 13, 2012.

 

Be sure to take check out the Stroked Text Tag in the FusionPro VDP Creator Tags Reference Guide.

Edited May 19, 2015 by David Miller

[Stack]

Thanks for the reply, David. That effects button affects the entire contents of a text box though, not just specific characters. I figured there may be some elaborate coding I can do but I opted just to switch the font of the particular character. In this case it was a simple vertical separator that used a font without a bold variant, so it was relatively easy to just switch to a bold font.

[David Miller]

That effects button affects the entire contents of a text box though, not just specific characters. I figured there may be some elaborate coding I can do but I opted just to switch the font of the particular character.

 

That is correct. But you can also use the Stroked Texted Tag via a JavaScript Rule:

 

<stroke color="name" width="size in hundredths of a point">...</stroke>

[Dan Korn]

I figured there may be some elaborate coding I can do but I opted just to switch the font of the particular character.

The tagging needed to apply a stroke/outline to some text is hardly what I would call "elaborate coding." It can be as simple as this:

return "Here is some <stroke>outlined</stroke> text.";

[Stack]

The tagging needed to apply a stroke/outline to some text is hardly what I would call "elaborate coding."

 

Well for somebody who works with coding, I would certainly hope not

[dreimer]

That is correct. But you can also use the Stroked Texted Tag via a JavaScript Rule:

 

<stroke color="name" width="size in hundredths of a point">...</stroke>

 

So I tried this and it doesn't seem to work for me. I am trying it this way because I have a template where my background art is pulled in as a resource and when I try the text effects built in function, all my type is stroked in the resource art. Dan has told me this is a known issue. Here is my rule with the treat returned strings as tagged text check.

return <stroke color="White" width="3000">HELP</stroke>

 

It just returns "HELP" as normal. Also, if it was a data field how would I place that in the rule. It looks at

return <stroke color="White" width="300">Field("Name")</stroke>

as hardcoded text. TIA

Edited May 19, 2015 by dreimer

[step]

So I tried this and it doesn't seem to work for me. I am trying it this way because I have a template where my background art is pulled in as a resource and when I try the text effects built in function, all my type is stroked in the resource art. Dan has told me this is a known issue. Here is my rule with the treat returned strings as tagged text check.

return <stroke color="White" width="3000">HELP</stroke>

 

It just returns "HELP" as normal. Also, if it was a data field how would I place that in the rule. It looks at

return <stroke color="White" width="300">Field("Name")</stroke>

as hardcoded text. TIA

 

Well you need to make it a string by putting quotes around it:

return '<stroke color="White" width="3000">HELP</stroke>';

 

To add a variable field you'd have your literal strings in quotes and your variables added to the string:

return '<stroke color="White" width="3000">' + Field("Name") + '</stroke>';

[dreimer]

As usual, thanks for your help Step. A few quotes here and there can change alot. Someday I will learn this JavaScript.

 

As I should have expected, this does the same and outlines my resource art. Seems to work just fine if my artwork is the background of the template.

Edited May 19, 2015 by dreimer