Make on-screen text readable over busy footage

White text vanishes on a bright sky. Dark text vanishes in a dim room. Footage changes from shot to shot, so a title that reads well at one second can disappear at the next. DepCut gives each title four ways to hold its ground, and each one lives in its own tab in the right panel when you select a title.

Start with the shadow

A new title comes with a shadow already on. Open Shadow to change it. The switch turns it on or off, and once it is on you get Color, Blur, and Opacity controls. A soft, fairly dark shadow separates light text from a mid-tone background without drawing attention to itself.

Add an outline

Open Outline and switch it on. You get a Color and a Width slider. An outline traces the edge of every letter, which helps when the background swings between light and dark behind the same words. Pick a color that contrasts with the text itself, such as a dark outline on white text.

Put a plate behind the words

Open Backdrop and switch it on for a box behind the title. The tab has Color, Opacity, and Radius, where a higher radius gives rounder corners. A backdrop is the steadiest choice on busy footage, because the text always sits on the same color no matter what plays underneath. Lower the opacity to let some of the picture show through.

Try a bubble

Open Bubble for a balloon behind the title. Choose Speech, Oval, Thought, or Burst, or None to remove it.

• Pick a Tail from the six positions along the top and bottom edges, or choose No tail. Burst has no tail.
• Set the balloon's Color and Opacity.
• Add an Outline to the balloon with the slider, then pick its color.

The balloon sizes itself to fit the text and stands in for the backdrop. When you add a light balloon behind light text, DepCut switches the text to a dark color so it does not disappear.

Style single words

Emphasis works best on one or two words. Open Words:

1. Click a word to pick it. Shift-click another word to pick every word between.
2. Use Bold, Italic, or Underline for the picked words.
3. Set a Color for the words, or a Box color to put a highlight behind them.
4. Press Clear all word styles to go back to a plain title.

These styles follow their words when you edit the text, so you can fix a typo without losing the emphasis.

The Behind tab has a Behind speaker switch that sits the title behind the person in the shot. It needs a clearly separated subject, and with no person detected the title shows as a normal title.

Pair all of this with sensible sizing. The Size tab sets the whole title, and Spacing and Line height adjust how the letters and lines sit. Keep lines short, and keep the title inside the frame's margins, where the preview's snap lines help you place it.

Your turn

Select a title in DepCut, switch on Backdrop, and scrub through your busiest shot to check that you can still read every word.