Drop Shadow Layering Question in Photoshop

#1

New here… and to fonts as well…

Trying to create a bitmap Open Type font that includes a hand-drawn, lower-left drop shadow. My issue is that the drop shadows of letters that appear later in words are covering parts of letters that appear earlier in words. Confusing, right? See examples below.

Wrong (drop shadows cover part of letters) & Right (all drop shadows appear behind letters):

Kate_Sample
Kate_Sample.jpg1010×901 598 KB

Is there some feature in photoshop that would allow me to switch the order of layering so that letters that appear later in words would be “below” previous letters? Or is there some other solution that I haven’t considered (other than putting each letter on it’s own layer)?

I’d appreciate any help or thoughts on the topic!
Thanks!
Kate

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#2

Hi Kate, there is no solution that we are aware of :frowning:

… but you could upvote the feature request here (FYI both PS and AI share the same text rendering capabilities): https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657-illustrator-feature-requests/suggestions/35460226-ability-to-switch-how-letters-overlap

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#3

Hello Kate,Some time ago I made a font, using Photoshop but it is vector font and it is not English but Russian language. It works even in simple text format, but you have to have a Russian keyboard.
I sent this font to Fontself team and I hope they will contact you and and send this font to you to try.
Good luck and all the best.

VZ

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#4

Bummer… I upvoted the request.

What is the best workaround? Any thoughts on an efficient way to create the desired output using multiple layers? I’m thinking:

  1. Create new layer, type in desired glyph, repeat for each letter
  2. Order them: last on top, first on bottom
  3. Select first and last letters and extend them to the likely length of word
  4. Align and distribute, make any necessary small adjustments to spacing

I am creating a template that I will use with this font so I need my workflow to be fast. Fortunately, there are only two small areas where I will use a font with drop shadow, but I would still like it to take a little time as possible.

Appreciate any advice on the subject!
Kate

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#5

Thanks @zevs for the submission but the challenge is that whenever glyphs overlap the shadows won’t be hidden below the previous glyph:

image
image.png1056×212 65.1 KB

@Kate This is a process you could automate via a script - provided you want & can afford to digg into the intricacy of scripting PS: https://www.adobe.com/devnet/photoshop/scripting.html

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#6

The only way I’ve been able to solve this (in Illustrator) is by using a non-shadow version of the font, use the appearance panel and add an extra stroke in white below to make the “cutout”. Then add another layer of fill and apply a transform to shift it right and down.
From memory, you can’t apply it to the “text”, but apply it to the “grouping” of the text, so it’s acting on the whole shape of all the letters instead of a letter at a time.
I find it useful to make the appearance a graphic style so I can more easily apply it to the part I want to (and then make global changes if i want to adjust something)

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