Results tagged “luminance” from Final Cut Studio, Avid, Adobe, and Video Streaming

In order for a text super to be readable, the text should (obviously) stand out from the picture that you composite it onto.  In some cases, you can manage this on a one-off basis: if you have a single title, for example, you can (and should) allow the specific picture for the title slide to dictate how you style your text.

Other times, you'll want to have more confidence that your text will stand out regardless of what picture happens to be underneath it.  For example, you might use subtitles, series titles, and multi-purpose templates like lower thirds over a variety of pieces of footage.  For that matter, imagine that the video under your title pans from, say, a (dark) mountain over to (bright) sky: you need for your text to be readable over both settings.

Traditionally, folks have improved the contrast of their text using treatments like heavy, high-contrast outlines (see, for example, many subtitles); drop shadows; and heavy-handed styles like bevels.  All of these approaches can be useful, but there are a couple of strategies that might allow you to make more subtle choices that are still visually acceptable.

Read on for some theory and a couple of tips ...