Get text to wrap around a drop cap

[Susan Culligan]

I want to use large drop caps in a document, but the text doesn't wrap around the letter, as I'd like. (See image.) Is there a way to get the text to wrap correctly?

[Scott Falkner · Accepted solution]

You'll need to make the drop cap a separate object and apply text wrap to that object. Easiest way would be select the drop cap, convert it to paths (this will make it an anchored object), de-anchor the drop cap, then apply text wrap.

1. Select the drop cap.
2. Press Command-Option-O or Control-Alt-O. (This will convert the letter to an anchored object.)
3. Select the letter then go to Anchored Object Options. Set its positioning to Custom. (Until you do that you cannot release it so it is no longer an anchored object).
4. Remove the drop cap from the paragraph.
5. Select the drop cap and go to Object > Anchored Object > Release.
6. Apply text wrap.

[Susan Culligan]

Thank you so much for your reply, Scott. I will do this. It seems like this
should be in the design of the product. But we can't have everything, I
guess.

Much appreciated,
Susan

[Private info removed by Moderator]

[The Accessible Dezinah]

Quote: " It seems like this should be in the design of the product."

Yes, it would be nice to have, but I believe it would be extremely difficult or impossible for any program to do. When the drop cap character is live text, it's identified to the program by the amount of horizontal space it is allocated, and that's what we see in our designs: that's the white block that the remaining body text wraps around.

In order to dected the exact shape of the letter, as you want with the P, the drop cap would need to be a computer object (rather than a character of live text) in order to detect its specific shape.

Maybe some day in the future a programmer will figure out a way to detect the shape of an individual live character of text, but I wouldn't hold my breath for this development.

[Scott Falkner]

I don't think this is asking too much. Computers were able to render drop caps and indent them when they ran on 16 MHz 386 and 68020 processors. In fact I’m pretty sure a Mac SE running an 8MHz 68000 could do it. With several thousand times the processing power available rendering a drop cap, determining the boundary, and wrapping around that should be a breeze. Especially since it can be done live once the type is a separate object.

[The Accessible Dezinah]

It's not a matter of computer power.

Rather, it's how can the software identify the shape of an individual live text character, rather than a character that is converted to paths.

[Scott Falkner]

The live text is already a path. The application is using the path to render the character.

[The Accessible Dezinah]

It appears this solution coverts the live drop cap character to a graphic object. Which then prevents it from begin edited. Also doesn't allow the file's content to be converted well enough to HTML, XML, accessible PDF, or EPUB.

Any solution for keeping the cap live?

[Susan Culligan]

Hi Scott. I did what you described, and it worked almost perfectly. The issues are:

1. The text abuts the "T" with no space in between (see first image).

2. I add 3 pixels of space (see second image) and align to the right side. All the selections except the first are grayed out, so I could only apply surrounding space to all sides.

3. The text wraps all wonky (technical term) (see third image).

I thought it might be that the text is aligned to the baseline, but removing that didn't make a difference

I see in the image you posted that you were able to apply space to the right, left, and above, but not the bottom, which looks perfect.

   

Any ideas?

[FRIdNGE]

… Something funny and quick I wrote for a client some months ago!

[video]

(^/)  The Jedi

[rubylith]

Is this script available somewhere? I have been searching for a solution to wrap body text around a drop cap like this without manual kerning and converting the text to a shape.

[Scott Falkner]

InDesign creates a path for the text wrap based on the shape of the object (the T) and your gap (3 points). Because you specified wrapping around the shape you can’t select different left, right, top, and bottom offsets because the wrap is not a rectangle. You just specify how much the wrap path is offset from the object. If you select the T with the Direct Select tool you will see the wrap path and you can edit it.

[Susan Culligan]

Thanks! It worked!! You're a prince!

--

*Susan Culligan*
Culligan Design & Type
culligandesignandtype.com
culligantype@gmail.com
831-234-5520