Inline Icons in Text

[Kim Lindgren]

Hi!

I am looking at getting one of Adobe's programs. I think I want to work with Illustrator, but I'm not completely sure.

I want to create cards for a game I am creating. There are a few absolute requirements which the software has to meet:

- Data merge. This does not seem like a problem with Adobe.

- Components/Symbols with instances. This appears to exist in both Adobe Illustrator and Adobe XD.

- Ability to create inline icons embedded in text. This is the crucial thing that I have not yet found support for anywhere. What it means is that if I write "Gain 1 GOLD" on a card, I can exchange "GOLD" for an icon. And this should of course work even with data merge.

So, is there any Adobe software that can do these three things?

This image shows an example of inline icons.

[marliton]

Hi. Illustrator seems to be the better option for you. If you can use a "symbol" font to get the icons, you can copy and paste them to replace the text you need.

[Monika Gause]

Data Merge: InDesign

Symbols: if you place your images, you can manage them via the links panel.

Inline icons with replacement. You want the replacement to happen while you type? Then create a custom font and add the symbols into it as ligatures. You need a font editor such as FontSelf (plugin for Illustrator) or Birdfont or one of the more expensive ones such as Glyphs to create that.

[John Mensinger]

Hi!

I am looking at getting one of Adobe's programs.

It's understandable that you'd want to economize, but if this job went to a pro designer, a combination of applications would be used. Graphics would come through Illustrator and/or Photoshop as applicable, with final layout and typesetting done in InDesign.

[Kim Lindgren]

Thank you all. If I use a font editor to create a custom font, do I have to tie each icon to a single character? Can I not tie the string "GOLD" to a gold icon as a kind of text variable?

[Monika Gause]

You would create a ligature of that icon.

[Kim Lindgren]

Alright, I see! I didn't know the word "ligature" until now. And such a special font could of course be created independently of which Adobe product I use and then be used like any other font?  

[Monika Gause]

Yes. It will be just a normal font.

There are lots of applications that can create it in all price ranges.

[Scott Falkner]

Overall I would use InDesign for the cards. It is ideal for inserting graphics in text and applying a global style to the graphic, making it easy to consistently size and position the icons and make global changes to them if you change the text.

The cards can be treated as pages in a long document. InDesign is superior for handling multipage documents because global changes to margins and page backgrounds is much easier.

Illustrator is the program you want for editing graphics, like the icons and perhaps hte card backgrounds (although Photoshop is probably ideal).

In the end you should use InDesign for the card layout, Illustrator for the icons, and Photshop for images.