SILHOUETTE STUDIO
Version tested: 4.5.815 Business Edition
Operating system tested: PC
Tested: 26 November 2024 / Nadine Spires
Cost: $49.99 (Designer Edition), $74.99 (Designer Edition Plus), $99.99 (Business Edition) – all are a one-time fee
Where to get it: https://www.silhouetteamerica.com/silhouette-studio
Free version: Available but with limited functions
Font file types to use: TTF/OTF, double stroke
Image file types to use: SVG, DXF (for free version)
How to See & Use the Fonts
First, make sure that the font is installed on your computer or device. Check the “Install fonts on [operating system]” guides for more information.
In this guide, the Spicy Sketcher font will be used for the text examples.
Open the Silhouette Studio app to get started with your project. Once the workspace has loaded, click on the “Text Tool” icon on the left-side of the screen. Then, click on the work area and begin typing your text when you see the cursor.
Silhouette Studio uses the default font, Arial, but you can easily change this to any font you like.
The font options can be found under the “Text Style Panel” on the right side of the screen. Click to open the panel and make sure that the “Text Style” icon is selected. Resize your text as needed to make it easier to work with.
You can change the font in one of two ways. While the text tool is still active, click + drag to highlight the text. Go to the “Text Style Panel” and select a font from the menu. If you know the name of the font, double click the search box and type the name.
The Spicy Sketcher font includes a single stroke version (ending in the number 1) and a double stroke version (ending in the number 2). The double stroke version is the one you’ll want to use in Silhouette Studio.
Alternatively, click away from the text to exit “Edit Mode”. Then, click once to select the text and proceed to change the font. If at any point you want to edit the text, just double click to enter “Edit Mode”.
Further creative adjustments can be made to your text depending on what you want to do.
Built-in kerning in a font has no effect in Silhouette Studio; the program doesn’t see it. You can manually increase or decrease the distance between letters (also known as “tracking”) by adjusting the “Character Spacing”. However, the space between two-letter ligatures will not change.
You can manually change the position and spacing between letters by ungrouping them. Keep in mind that once ungrouped, the text is no longer editable.
Make sure that you have completed your editing, including adding ligatures and glyphs (see next section below), before proceeding with this next step.
Once editing is done, select the text and right-click. Click on “Ungroup” to separate the letters into individual objects.
Pay close attention to any multi-letter ligatures that you have added to the text. The “Ungroup” option won’t work with these, and requires an additional step.
After ungrouping the other letters in the text, right-click the ligature and click “Release Compound Path”.
Now you can easily shift the letters around for a more creative style.
How to Access Alternates, Ligatures, and Extended Character Sets
The example font, Spicy Sketcher, contains both alternate characters and multi-letter ligatures. With these, you can add little accents to parts of your text to make it stand out.
Accessing ligatures, alternates and extended characters requires a secondary program such as Windows Character Map (PC), MainType (PC), or Font Book (Mac). While Silhouette Studio does have a “Glyphs” panel (under the Text Style panel), double-stroke fonts don’t show up due to the strokes being so thin that they appear invisible.
Outline fonts, however, are clearly displayed, as seen in the image below.
In this case, you will have to use an alternative program to copy and paste extra characters into your text. For this example, MainType (PC) was used. Open the program and search for your font. Under the “Characters” panel, select the “Private Use Area” from the drop-down menu.
Here you can view all the extra characters. Click + hold over the image to see a larger preview of the character you want to use.
Right click the character you want and then select “Copy to Clipboard”.
Go back to Silhouette Studio and double click the text to enter “Edit Mode”. Highlight the letters you want to change and press Ctrl + V (Windows) or Command + V (Mac) to paste in the character that you copied. The image below shows the original text above and the adjusted text below.
How to Use SVG or Other Alphabet Sets
Some fonts may include a vector file containing the character set of the font, all in a true single stroke format. The most recent ZIP for Spicy Sketcher includes this type of file. Here is how you can use it.
In the Silhouette Studio app, go to File > Open and locate the Spicy Sketcher font folder stored on your device. Click on the “Spicy Sketcher Alphabet SVG” file.
The SVG file will appear on your workspace as shown in the image below.
The SVG characters show up as black lined letters with a white fill. Silhouette Studio automatically adds this fill, but it can easily be turned off and will have no effect on the final result. Click on the “Fill” box on the top left-hand corner of the screen and select the hatched “No Fill” option.
Select all of the SVG characters and shift them over to the side, outside of the artboard, so that you have space to work. A quick way to drag and drop multiple letters onto the workspace is to hold Shift + click on the ones you want to use. Then drag the selected characters over to the workspace.
You can then arrange, resize, rotate and experiment with different ideas.
By changing the line color of the letters, you can get a preview of what your project will look like before sending it to draw. Click on the “Line” color box, located next to the “Fill” box, and choose your favorite color.
You can also adjust the line width, but note that the final result will depend on the pen type that you use. Before clicking the “Send” button, remember to select and delete the unused letters in your project.
Save the project as a new file to avoid overwriting the “Spicy Sketcher SVG” File. Go to File > Save As, then select a location to save to. Under “Save as type”, choose the SVG option.
Create a variation of your text using the alternates, ligatures, and character sets. These can be added to your library for quick and easy access in future projects.
If this program has been updated since this test and this guide no longer works, please drop me a line at the contact form so I can update this page!