How to make text write itself on a video

The effect people search for as “handwriting text animation” is simple to describe: the words appear as if an invisible pen were writing them onto the video, one stroke after another. Doing it by hand in a motion graphics app means tracing every letter with a mask. In Inky Clips the fonts are made of pen strokes, so the writing order comes built in. You type, and the text draws itself.

Try it on the sample clip below. Change the words and pick a different pen.

The clip shows “Day one in Lisbon” written in Cursive.

Clip

Cat and laser dotYawning catWaterfallNobel laureateMoon scientistEarth scientist

Write something

Pen

HandwritingSubtitlesCleanTitlesDecorative

Handwriting fonts

ScriptScript BoldCursiveAllureFelixElfin

Ink

ClassicNeonPastelEarthOcean

Classic inks

WhiteBlackHighlighterCoralSky

Ink: White

Style

OutlineBackground

Pen tip

Glowing dotSparkCometPencil

What you need

• A video file on your computer (anything your browser can play, usually MP4 or MOV), or none at all: the editor can start from a blank canvas or a photo.
• A current Chrome, Edge or Safari. Export uses the browser’s built-in video encoder.
• A Google account to sign in. The editor is free, and your video is never uploaded.

Getting the writing to look right

Draw time is the most important setting

Draw time is how long the pen takes to finish the whole text, from 0.2 seconds up to 10. A two-word title reads naturally at about 1.5 seconds; a full sentence wants three or four. If the writing feels frantic, it is almost always too short. The timeline shows it too: the solid part of a text’s bar is the drawing, the lighter part is the time it stays on screen afterwards.

One by one or all at once

At the bottom of Style, Draw switches between One by one, where letters are written in order like real handwriting, and All at once, where every stroke grows at the same time. The second is quicker and more graphic; it suits short labels better than sentences.

Easing

Easing shapes the pen’s speed. Smooth (the default) starts and finishes gently, Linear keeps an even pace that feels mechanical in a good way for tech content, and Ease out starts quickly and settles, which makes a title land.

A pen tip sells the illusion

Pointer puts something at the tip of the line while it writes: Glowing dot, Spark, Comet or Pencil. Without one the text simply grows; with one there is visibly something doing the writing. Pencil is the most literal, Comet the most cinematic.

Readable over any footage

White ink disappears over snow and sky. Turn on Outline to put a dark edge around the strokes (it turns light behind dark ink), or switch on Background for a rounded box behind each line and lower its Background opacity until the footage shows through.

More than one piece of text

Each Add text creates its own lane on the timeline, starting wherever the playhead is. To write a second line after the first, move the playhead to where the first one finishes and add another. To reuse a look, select a text and click Duplicate text (or press Cmd/Ctrl + D), then change the words. Press Delete to remove the selected text and Space to play or pause.

Exporting

Export renders on your computer at your video’s full resolution and keeps its sound. The result is an MP4 (H.264) that any app or social network accepts. There’s no separate size setting: a vertical phone clip exports vertical, a 4K clip exports in 4K. Your project also stays in the library on this computer, so you can come back and change the words later.

Where to go next

If you’re unsure which pen to use, choosing a handwriting font for video compares them, and every one has its own page in the font gallery. For vertical video, read handwriting text for TikTok. And if you just want a quick clip without opening the editor, try the handwriting animation generator.