Balloon Tales Comic lettering tips, tricks, articles, interviews and more, from Comicraft, the comic industry's leading lettering and design studio. http://www.balloontales.com Tutorial: Creating the Moritat font The creation of Moritat's lettering font for Elephantmen War Toys: Yvette. A day's work compressed into three minutes... July 1, 2009 http://www.balloontales.com/articles/moritat/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/articles/moritat/ Text and the City: Route 66 For spring break this year, I drove the family through SoCal and Arizona in an RV. The Grand Canyon was jaw-droppingly awesome, but the highlight of the trip for me was cruising Route 66 and looking for old road and motel signs. The family thinks I'm weird, but too bad -- I'm driving! April , 2009 http://www.balloontales.com/articles/route66/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/articles/route66/ Production: Aged Comic Cover How to create an aged, crusty old-looking comic cover. July 1, 2008 http://www.balloontales.com/tips/aged/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/tips/aged/ Lettering: Thought Balloons How to create thought balloons in Illustrator. April 15, 2008 http://www.balloontales.com/tips/thought/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/tips/thought/ Lettering: Opentype Ligatures How to enable custom ligatures that automatically substitute any two letters in a row, or disable them if you prefer. August 7, 2007 http://www.balloontales.com/tips/ligatures/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/tips/ligatures/ Text and the City: San Francisco San Francisco is just full of cool old metal signage. Here's some we found in and around Fisherman's Wharf and Chinatown. June 1, 2007 http://www.balloontales.com/articles/sanfrancisco/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/articles/sanfrancisco/ Heroes Comics Fabrice Sapolsky interviews John Roshell about his work on the Heroes website and webcomics for the French magazine Comic Box. May 1, 2007 http://www.balloontales.com/interviews/heroes/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/interviews/heroes/ Publishing: Getting Started in the Industry Advice on getting started, or breaking into, the comics industry. Whatever it takes. March 1, 2007 http://www.balloontales.com/tips/getting_started/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/tips/getting_started/ Lettering: Gradients in Illustrator How to fill objects with gradient fills. January 1, 2007 http://www.balloontales.com/tips/gradient/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/tips/gradient/ Establishing a Career in Comics Richard Starkings replies to University design student Ryan Scales' questions on breaking into the field, establishing a personal style and more. November 1, 2006 http://www.balloontales.com/interviews/career/icon.gif http://www.balloontales.com/interviews/career/