Manga Lettering

漫画の描き文字 / 1930s– / Style / Lettering

In Japanese manga, sound effects and even the feel of silence are drawn as pictures, from a booming don to a hushed shiin. Hand-lettering turns the texture of a sound into line weight and shape, dissolving the border between image and word inside the panel.

Manga Lettering — AI-generated interpretation 1 — AI-generated interpretation, not a reference work

Manga Lettering — Unknown artist, Taishō-era manga, hand-drawn katakana scattered across the page — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain — Unknown artist, Taishō-era manga, hand-drawn katakana scattered across the page — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

Manga Lettering — Kitazawa Rakuten, Tokyo Puck cover, 1905, hand-drawn title lettering — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain — Kitazawa Rakuten, Tokyo Puck cover, 1905, hand-drawn title lettering — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

At a glance

Visual cues

Sound drawn as shape
Weight matched to texture
Placement crossing panels
Even silence written (shiin)

Best used for

Comics and paneled ads where sound must be written inside the picture
Still images given the flow of time without captions or balloons

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Dictionary entry

Type: Line weight and edge shape carry the hardness of the sound
Composition: Lettering straddling panel borders and figures, following the reading path
Material: Written with the same pen as the art, reversed white against solid black
Caution: Setting sound effects in a ready-made typeface keeps the hardness and speed out of the line, leaving a note floating above the drawing.
Further study: Tezuka's sound effects / the invention of shiin / the translation problem

Related entries

Saul Bass Title Design (ソール・バスのタイトルデザイン)Shared effects: Exhilaration / Play.Compare Manga Lettering and Saul Bass Title Design
i-mode Emoji (iモード絵文字)Shared effects: Intimacy / Play.Compare Manga Lettering and i-mode Emoji

Cite this entry

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Link: https://indexstyle.org/styles/manga-lettering
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