Ok I confess, I cheated a bit with the title for this piece but it fits. I will spare the bad and the ugly by naming no names, not even of the good. Because, when you get used to good quality lettering in comic books, it’s amazing how distracting lettering that is even a little off can be and who wants to be called out publicly for being that distracting aspect of a book. And yes, lettering is more than simply typing words onto the pages (in case you thought that is all it was)
I just read yet another comic that I was enjoying for the story but kept being pulled out of the it by the lettering. Now, the lettering wasn’t horrendous in this book (unlike a few I have looked at recently) but it was enough to distract me. To many different styles, colors and even sizes of font. I actually flipped the pages in such a way as to be able to compare the font from one page to the next. It was the same character speaking so it wasn’t done to differentiate speakers, and the character wasn’t yelling on one page and not the other. It was just slightly different in size but enough that it caught my eye and pulled me out of the story. I wasn’t looking for perfection, but I don’t expect to not be able to get from the start to the finish of a book without being distracted by the quality of the lettering, not once, not twice, but numerous times.
I understand the need to save money, so am not as surprised when this happens with a new self-published team trying to break into the industry. Though I have told at least one writer of such a book that he should tell the artist that did the lettering to check out the work of a letterer who I have accused of spoiling me by putting out quality work in book after book. However, to find lettering that is off this much in a book from an established publisher is truly a disappointment.
So to those letterers that put out quality work on a consistent basis, I blame you for spoiling me (and other readers) but I also want to thank you for doing a great job that supports the story without distracting from it.
To those that have lettering for the blind on one page, lettering that needs a magnifying glass on the next, placement that makes one suspect that the artist just didn’t want to put in the effort to fill in the full panel, please please please, go out and look at other books. Look at what works, what doesn’t detract from the story and art, and what elevates it to a higher level by being unique without being distracting.
Now to go back to reading comics and hoping that the next book has lettering done by one of the pros that knows how to do it well!
Consistency – that’s what I look for in a letterer. They are the font of the story. Only when words are extreme (oh like Kahhhhhnnnnnn! in the Star Trek Movie) do they need special treatment – then the letterer needs to work with the artist to make it part of the piece. Those are my thoughts, flip font too much and I’m outta there. Life to short to read bad lettering, bad writing, or see lousy movies.