Screen Text plug-in
Screen Text is designed to imitate text scrolling up a screen. The plug-in can generate random text streams, or you can enter your own text and set up a text scroll. The scrolling text can slowly reveal itself as if it’s being typed in, or the text lines can appear all at once, or one line can display at a time. Screen Text is terrific for producing random scrolling text that looks output by a computer.
Which plug-in to use? Creating one line at a time
Text Hacker, TypeOn and Screen Text all create the effect of one line overwriting another. Which plug-in you use depends upony the exact effect that you want.
Options Box
This is where you tell Screen Text what font to use and what specific text to display. Type text into the Input field or click the Load button to import a text doc. Alternately, you can generate words randomly by leaving the input field blank and checking the Random Characters checkbox.
See Common controls, Options Box
Random Characters checkbox
If you choose not to enter text manually in the Options Box, you can have Screen Text generate random text. By adding Random Characters, you can quickly generate grids of text that mimic data being spit out by a computer. NOTE: If you don’t enter any text into the Options dialog, and don’t turn on Random Characters, no text will appear onscreen.
Character Attributes> Font Size, Font Size Randomness
Character Attributes> Rate of Change of Characters, ROC Randomness
Time Offset
Hinting checkbox
Composite On Original checkbox
See Common controls, Font & Character
Main Setup group
The Main Setup group sets the origination point of the text lines and the basic appearance of their scrolling.
Main Setup> Starting Point
Sets the origination point of the text. The text scrolls in whatever direction the Direction of Lines control is set to, which is typically upwards.
Main Setup> Length of Lines, Length Randomness
Controls how long the text lines are. The higher the value, the longer the lines. Line length is also affected by other characteristics like number of characters in the line and the Display Speed control.
Fonts with normal spacing will cause the lines to vary in length slightly because most fonts have certain letters that are closer together than other letters. If you use a monospaced font, which has exactly the same spacing between all letters, every line with the same number of characters will be exactly the same length. You can see this effect by comparing a normal spaaed font like Times New Roman to a monospaced font like Monaco.
Length Randomness plays a key role in allowing Screen Text to generate realistic looking displays. A real screen would have lines of varying lengths, and this is exactly what Length of Lines Randomness allows for. With Randomness set to 0, you just get one big block of characters scrolling up the screen. With Randomness set to a positive amount, the lines are created with different lengths.
At left, Length of Lines at 40, Randomness at 0. At right, Length of Lines at 40, Randomness at 100.
Main Setup> Scroll Speed
Controls how fast the lines scroll, or rather, how fast the lines of text move between rows. The speed is measured in pixels per frame. The higher the value, the faster the lines of text will move.
If Scroll Speed is 0, then the first line is created and... sits there. This is because each line of text has to move out of the way before a new line of text can be created. At a value of 0, the first line that's created never moves out of the way.
If you want to add a bit more realism to the text, keyframe the Scroll Speed. When typing, most people don’t type lines at a consistent speed, and even computers vary how fast they output results. instead, typing often happens in bursts of speed.
If the Lock to Grid checkbox is turned off, the lines will move smoothly between rows. If Lock to Grid is turned on, the lines will appear to jump between rows.
The Scroll Speed setting is ignored if Display Speed is set above 0 and the DS Controls Scroll Speed checkbox is selected. This is because Display Speed causes the lines to be typed on, appearing one (or more) character at a time, instead of appearing all at once.
Left to right, Scroll Speed at 5 and 10. The Timeline marker is at Frame 30 for both.
Main Setup> Color
Main Setup> Random Color
Main Setup> Frequency of Random Color
See Common controls, Color & Rotation
Main Setup> Vertical Alignment checkbox
Constrains the characters to columns, which spaces the letters evenly. This forces the characters to be psuedo-monospaced; however, due to varying character width,s the result can be a little odd. You can adjust this spacing by changing the Space Between Characters parameter.
Together, Vertical Alignment and Lock To Grid allow you to constrain the characters to Screen Text’s underlying grid. With both of these selected, you end up with an effect very similar to the Text Grid plug-in.
Main Setup> Lock To Grid checkbox
When turned on, lines are constrained to rows. Lock To Grid causes the lines to jump between rows.
When turned off, which is the default setting, lines move in a smooth motionas they scroll from row to row.
Line Spacing and Setup group
The Line Spacing and Setup group controls the space between lines as the text scrolls, which shapes the effect of typing or rolling text.
Go to the Line Spacing and Setup page
Preset Characters group
See Common controls, Preset Characters
Kerning group