Tips on a drop shadow for text

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Karela

I have some text to which I have added a drop shadow for depth- a very subtle one with a lot of spread and transparency. I did it originally in Photoshop for a mock-up and now I am actually working on it in Scribus and want to have the same effect.

Should I :
a) use the "shadow" tool for shadowing text and if so, how can I control the spread and transparency, currently the only effect that I find is very dark and not particularly subtle. Does this give a good shadow effect (I have worked with programmes, such as Freehand, where it does not look very good).

b)copy the text, desaturate it, add a gaussian blur and make it partly transparent and shift it into position. (This is what I sometimes do in photoshop, but I actually don't know if the desaturation and gaussian blur even exist in Scribus).


GarryP

Karela, it really depends on the exact effect you're after. (A 'drop shadow' can be loads of different things and look very different depending on your exact requirements.)

The text shadow effect in Scribus is fairly limited but can be used for simple things. (You can change the shading percentage to make the colour more 'diffuse'.)

Scribus currently only has a blur effect for images; you can't use it on text.

Transparency, where allowed, can only be used in some of the later PDF formats so using it would depend on that.

I think your best bet - using Scribus-only functions - would be to use multiple copies of the text with lighter shades (or transparency), as in the attached picture, but the printed effect won't be very good and it's a pain to do.

Otherwise, I'd generally recommend using Inkscape to create the text and import it into Scribus as an SVG (while noting that Scribus doesn't handle all SVG transparencies so you'll need to do tests).

Or you could try GIMP if resolution isn't an issue.

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GarryP

Karela, I've just noticed this post on Google+ https://plus.google.com/109612024486187515483/posts/GBDEY2y851e which may be of some interest. It's only in 1.5svn - a developmental release - at the moment but worth keeping an eye on.

Karela

Thanks, when do you think that this version will be available?

In the meantime I have just done it in photoshop and will import as a tiff.

I experimented to see if after converting the text to outline it would let me blur it, but no go.

GarryP

Unfortunately I don't know when 1.5 will be released. From past release dates I'd guess that it would be this year sometime but only the developers would have a reasonable idea.

However, the more people that are testing 1.5.0svn the faster it'll be ready as a stable production release so if you have some spare time I'm sure there will be plenty of things you could help with.

You can get more info here http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/Development if you're interested.

Karela

How can I get my hands on a version of the 1.5 svn?

GarryP

That's a very good question.

It used to be available on SourgeForge but I've just looked and it seems to have gone missing.

However there is a 1.4.4svn at http://sourceforge.net/projects/scribus/files/ which seems to be the current development release.

And this page http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/Category:Installation shows how you can install from source code on various OSes.

As for 1.5.0svn I really don't know what's happened to it. I think your best bet would be check the mailing lists at http://lists.scribus.info/mailman/listinfo/scribus or ask someone on the Scribus IRC at irc://irc.freenode.net/#scribus or even try the Google+ page at https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/110151182273894491551 . (The 1.5.x Roadmap http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/1.5.x_Roadmap was edited recently but I'm in the dark as to how people can now get at the code.)

Sorry, I would have liked to have been more helpful but things seem to have changed since I last got my own version running.

I hope you get a better answer from someone else.