ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS 7.0
User Guide
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The Character panel lets you apply both color fill and color stroke to text, control the stroke width, and control the
stacking position of the fill and stroke. You can change these properties for individual, selected characters; selected
Source Text keyframes; all text in a layer; or all text across multiple selected layers.
You can also control the stacking position of a text layer’s fill and stroke using the All Fills Over All Strokes or All
Strokes Over All Fills options, which override the Fill Over Stroke or Stroke Over Fill properties of individual
characters.
To add a stroke (outline) to text
1
Select the characters to which you want to add a stroke.
2
Set a stroke size with the Stroke Width
button in the Character panel.
3
Set the stroke color.
4
Choose one of the following in the Character panel to control the stroke’s position:
Stroke Over Fill, Fill Over Stroke
The stroke of only selected text appears over or behind the fill.
All Strokes Over All Fills, All Fills Over All Strokes
Strokes appear over or behind fills in the entire text layer.
To change the text color
The text you enter gets its color from the Fill and Stroke boxes in the Character panel. You can change the text color
before or after you enter text. You can change the fill or stroke color of individual, selected characters; selected Source
Text keyframes; all text in a layer; or all text across multiple selected layers.
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In the Character panel, do one of the following:
•
Click the Fill box to select a color in the Color dialog box.
•
Click the Stroke box to select a color in the Color dialog box.
•
Click the Swap Fill And Stroke button to swap colors for fill and stroke.
•
Click the No Color button to remove the fill or stroke, depending on which box is in front. To bring a box to the
front, click it.
•
Click the Eyedropper and then click any color on-screen to set the fill or stroke to that color.
•
Click the Set To Black or Set To White icon to set the fill or stroke to that color.
To specify kerning and tracking
Kerning
is the process of adding or subtracting space between specific letter pairs.
Tracking
is the process of creating
an equal amount of spacing across a range of letters. Positive kerning or tracking values move characters apart
(adding to the default spacing); negative values move characters closer together (reducing the default spacing).
Note:
When you open a project that was last saved in After Effects 6.0, text in the project may lie differently than in After
Effects 6.0 because of improvements in kerning behavior.
You can automatically kern type using metrics kerning or optical kerning. Metrics kerning uses kern pairs, which are
included with most fonts. Kern pairs contain information about the spacing of specific pairs of letters such as LA,
To, Tr, Ta, Tu, Te, Ty, Wa, WA, We, Wo, Ya, and Yo. After Effects uses metrics kerning by default so that specific pairs
are automatically kerned when you import or type text.
Summary of Contents for AFTER EFFECTS 7.0
Page 1: ...Chapter 1 User Guide...
