A Little Issue with Drop Caps

[Chris26]

Here is the situation as seen in screenshot:

The 'F' of 'After' is too far away from the Drop caps 'A' of 'After'.  Bring them closer through a negative value brings the 'S' of 'Should' obviously too close and underneath the Drop caps 'A'. I simply can not figure a method to bring the F of After subtly closer to the Drop caps.  I tried creating a manual text box with the Letter A inside and using text wrap but that did not succeed either.  I wonder if anybody has any suggestions please?

 

[firstdefence]

I find the easiest way is to type a separate letter, so, in this case it would be the letter 'A' and then convert the the Drop Cap to a Curve and set the text wrapping accordingly. Probably not ideal but it's a workaround and it works.

 

[GarryP]

Another possibility would be to Float a Pinned, Converted To Curves, Artistic Text layer in the Frame Text with Tight Text Wrap – see attached image. (Similar to above but the Drop Cap automatically moves with the frame.)

One problem with this, and the method mentioned earlier, is that the spell check will flag “fter” as a problem, as can be seen in firstdefence’s image.

[Chris26]

These are great suggestions - thank you both of you.  I will try both - thank you.

[GarryP]

You’re welcome.

If neither of these work well enough then just say so and someone may be able to come up with something else.

[Chris26]

Well in the process of trying out both suggestions I discovered something that can not be done by inserting measurements in the text wrap settings, no matter how hard I tried.  I attach screenshot where I could manipulate the second sentence independent of the first sentence and so achieved what I needed. But without either of your suggestions I would not have discovered this so another thank you.

 

[GarryP]

One other idea is to use a different typeface – maybe one that’s more ‘square’ and/or ‘blocky’ – for the Drop Cap.

A quick look at various real-world uses shows that the Drop Cap is often different from the body text.

[Chris26]

2 hours ago, GarryP said:

One other idea is to use a different typeface – maybe one that’s more ‘square’ and/or ‘blocky’ – for the Drop Cap.

A quick look at various real-world uses shows that the Drop Cap is often different from the body text.

Hallo Garry, nce of you to add this, I actually was thinking about this as a very last resort - but I thought I would go the complicated route first😊

[Chris26]

On 11/7/2022 at 10:59 AM, N.P.M. said:

Here's another option;
Make the first letter white or page color if you will.
Create an artistic text object with the obscured letter>give it a textwrap option and adjust the textwrapshape accordingly.
Now the text will be complete but you may need to adjust the placing when you alter the text as it will not flow with the text
 

DropCapFit.afpub

Hallo NPM, thank you for this I will take a look at it and see if it is more complicated than my own solution, if your idea turns out to be quite easy I probably won't use it.