I chose to manually kern a 50-page menu instead of using a variable font, and my wrist is still sore from last Thursday.

Has anyone found a faster way to handle custom type spacing on big text-heavy projects without losing your mind?

3 comments

3 Comments

What did your mouse ever do to you to deserve that? I've been there, and it feels like you're paying for your design choices with actual joint pain. Mapping out the bad pairs first is smart, but on a 50 page menu, that's still a mountain of clicks. Have you looked into any scripting for your layout program? It can feel like learning another language, but setting up a simple script to adjust spacing for your problem letters might save your hand.

gavin_burns491mo ago

Manually kerning 50 pages sounds like actual torture. I did a long brochure once, letter by letter, and my eyes just glazed over after page ten. Have you tried making a really detailed character style sheet first? Like, map out your worst letter pairs once, then apply it as a global style. Still a ton of work, but maybe saves your wrist a bit.

simon_chen24d ago

Ouch, that sounds brutal. @the_ray has a point about scripting, honestly. Might be time to learn a bit of code to save your hand.