The Bulblamp font works like a sign painter’s kit. Type your word once in Photoshop, Illustrator or Sketch, copy it onto as many layers as you need and set each layer in a different Bulblamp layer font. They line up exactly, so a cinema marquee, a theater poster or a carnival sign gets a lit letter, a bulb frame and a shadow in separate colors. Change the order of the layers and the same word takes on a new look.
Bulblamp has twelve layer fonts in five groups, from shadows at the bottom to bulbs on top, and the file names are numbered 1 to 5 to show the stacking order. Every layer is an ordinary font, so each takes its own color, and any layer can be left out: without the bulbs you get a plain shadowed title, with them the word lights up.
The product includes predesigned styles such as Flatty, Vegas, Movie, Ocean and Punk, and the specimens list the layer stack behind each one, so you can copy a look or change it. A red sunburst “Night Show” poster and a purple “Night Blues” identity show the same layers in warm and in cool colors. The how-to sheet in the specimens is written for Illustrator.
Bulblamp is made for short words at large sizes: a theater name, a film title, a bar sign, an event poster. Put it on a dark background if the bulbs are to glow, and keep the line to a few words.
The free file is the outline layer alone, so it shows how a layer fits a word, not the full marquee.
Neonlife covers the other half of a sign job: neon tubes instead of bulbs, in one layer rather than a stack.
