Pulled From My Files #31: Lettering to Fit

Images © DC Comics.

Hand lettering on vellum overlay for HOUSE OF SECRETS #16 page 5 (1998). The type at lower right is done on the computer and pasted onto the vellum.

Here’s the best scan I could get of the printed page from the massive one-volume collection of a few years ago. The lettering overlay was photostatted in the DC production department and then pasted onto the finished art, or at least I think that’s what was done. The placement isn’t quite right, most obvious at the top right of the big five, where the lettering was meant to fill that white space. But I’m sure it was a tricky job to get it in, as the lettering was intentionally run very close to the border lines. Even then there are lots of hyphenated words. It might have been made harder if the art paper changed size due to changes in humidity, or if the photocopy of the art I used to letter over wasn’t quite the right proportions, which can happen. This job might have been easier to do with digital lettering, though the perspective angle needed would be tricky there too.