01
The hero
The name in pink neon on a brick wall, with a cyan bolt and the line Neon Sign Letters underneath.
Bent glass neon tubes in seven stackable layers · v1.000
VoltwireVoltwireVoltwireVoltwireVoltwireVoltwire
Voltwire is lettering bent from glass tube, for arcade and cyberpunk titles, bar and motel signs, menus and posters. The tube, its white-hot centre, the light on the wall and the black paint where the glass turns away are each their own font, so you light the sign in any colour you like.
Type tester
Try it with your own words
All six layers are stacked here in the hero's Hot Pink, with the wall glow blurred in. Try the other neon colours, switch Effects off to see the bare layers, or the layers off for Solid. The flicker sets darken a tube here and there.
24 px
Open All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & Arcade
36 px
Open All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & Arcade
56 px
Open All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & Arcade
88 px
Open All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & ArcadeOpen All Night ⚡ Bar & Arcade
This preview covers Basic Latin and the neon extras. The full font adds every accented letter.
Features
Made for game interfaces
A neon sign font of bent glass tubes: seven layer fonts stack into a glowing sign with a hot core, painted tube ends, two flicker sets and neon extras.
01
A sign in seven fonts
Shadow, Halo, Glow, Tube, Blockout and Core stack into a lit neon sign with no plug-ins; Solid is the bare tube for one-colour use.
02
One width of glass
Every stroke is the same round tube, bent around corners rather than drawn with joins, so a word looks like it came off a neon bench.
03
Real gaps and painted ends
Where a tube meets another it stops short, and the Blockout layer paints the turned-away ends black, like the back of a real sign.
04
Flicker on demand
Two stylistic sets darken tubes for you: ss01 on every fourth letter for a sign that's starting to go, ss02 on every letter for an old motel.
05
Neon sign extras
A bolt, heart, star, note, cocktail, controller, invader, crown, cherries, rocket, smiley, dice and two dividers, typed like letters in every layer.
06
Capitals and lowercase
388 characters per font, a full lowercase, and accents bent as separate tubes that hang clear of the letter.
Built-in icons
Fourteen icons you can type
Each icon is a character in the font. Click one to copy it, then paste it into anything set in Voltwire.
Neon sign extras
Dividers
Case study
How Voltwire was designed
Why I made it
Neon turns up in a lot of games: arcade halls, cyberpunk streets, roadside diners, a bar in the corner of a level. Most neon fonts are a thin outline with an outer glow added in a design app, and that look falls apart once the text has to live in an engine or change colour at runtime.
I wanted a font that already knows how a neon sign is put together, so the glow, the glass and the hot centre can be coloured separately and still line up, in Photoshop, on a web page or in Godot.
Built like a sign
A neon bender works with one tube of glass and heats it into shape, so every Voltwire letter uses one stroke width with rounded ends. Where a stroke would cross or join another, it stops short and leaves a gap, the way glass can't run through glass.
The tube is split into the parts you see on a real sign. Core is the white line of lit gas down the middle, Tube is the coloured glass around it, Glow and Halo are the light it throws on the wall close up and far out, and Shadow is the sign's shadow behind it. Blockout is the black paint on the tube ends that turn back into the wall.
Small details
Accents and dots are their own short pieces of tube that hang clear of the letter, which is how a sign maker would bend them. The lowercase stays round and open, so a long word such as Continue still reads from across a dark room.
Real neon rarely works perfectly, so I added two stylistic sets. Flicker leaves one tube dark on every fourth letter, and Burnt out does it on every letter, both without retyping anything.
Extras that glow too
The fourteen extras are the things you find in neon on a street at night: a bolt, a heart, a cocktail glass, cherries, dice, a crown, a space invader and two dividers. They sit on Unicode codes, so they type like letters and pick up every layer and colour.
When one colour is enough, for a button or a small label, Voltwire Solid gives the bare tube on its own.
In use
02
The Photoshop template
The editable hero layout from the download, with the name in pink and Open All Night in a cyan framed box.
03
Arcade screen
A Game Over screen with red and yellow neon, invaders, three tube-lit score counters and a row of extras.
04
Anatomy of a letter
A single t labelled with its glass tube, painted blockout, the gap where tubes meet, the hot core and the glow and shadow, next to Spanish and Czech samples.
05
The layers
Solid, Shadow, Halo, Glow, Tube, Blockout and Core on their own, then all seven stacked on a brick wall.
06
Flicker sets
Starlight Motel in amber three times: every tube lit, ss01 with a dark tube on every fourth letter, and ss02 with one on every letter.
07
Neon colours
Six signs in hot pink, electric cyan, acid lime, sunset orange, ultraviolet and arcade red.
08
Neon extras
The twelve neon symbols and two dividers, each with its Unicode code, lit in different colours.
09
Character set
Capitals, lowercase, figures, punctuation, symbols and accented letters, each row in a different neon colour.
What you get
Everything in the download
- Desktop fontsOTF for design apps, TTF for game engines and Windows, every layer.
- Web fontsWOFF2 for every layer, with unlimited web use.
- Game engine packBMFont bitmap fonts (.fnt, .xml and .png atlas) at 32, 64 and 128 px, for Godot, Unity, GameMaker, LibGDX, Phaser, MonoGame and Love2D.
- Photoshop templateAn editable hero layout with live type layers, layer effects and textures.
- README and licenseSetup tips for design apps, websites and game engines, and the full license.
License
Included with every purchase
- Games and apps, embedded for unlimited copies sold
- Logos, merch, videos, streams and print, with no limit on sales
- Installed on unlimited computers: yours, your team's and your company's
- Websites, with unlimited page views and traffic
Ask me first
- Products where customers type their own text in the font
- Resale in asset packs, templates or font collections
Please don't share or resell the font files. For anything the license doesn't cover, email me. idris.hadjoudj@gmail.com
FAQ
Before you buy
How do the 7 layers work?
Voltwire comes as 7 layer fonts (Solid, Shadow, Halo, Glow, Tube, Blockout, Core) with the same spacing and kerning. Type the same text in each, stack the copies exactly on top of each other and give each its own colour. Voltwire Solid also works on its own in one colour.
How do I get the glowing look from the images?
Stack the layers from Shadow up to Core and colour them from dark to light, as in the recipes on this page. Then soften Halo with a wide blur and Glow with a small one, so they read as light on the wall rather than shapes. Tube, Blockout and Core stay sharp.
How do I make the sign flicker?
Turn on stylistic set 1 (Flicker) for a dark tube on every fourth letter, or stylistic set 2 (Burnt out) for one on every letter.
Can I use Voltwire in a game I sell, or for its logo?
Yes. Commercial use is included for games, apps, logos, merch, videos, streams and print, with no limit on sales, and you can embed the fonts and bitmap fonts in games and apps for unlimited copies. Products where your customers type their own text, and resale in asset packs, need an extended license: just ask.
Does Voltwire work in Unity, Godot and GameMaker?
Yes. Use the TTF files in any engine that imports fonts, or the included game engine pack: BMFont bitmap fonts at 32, 64 and 128 px for Godot, Unity, GameMaker, LibGDX, Phaser, MonoGame and Love2D.
Can I use Voltwire on my website?
Yes. WOFF2 web fonts are included, and web use is unlimited, with no cap on page views or traffic.
Which languages does it support?
Each font has 388 characters, covering Western and Central European languages.
Is Voltwire part of a bundle?
Yes. Voltwire is in The Complete Font Collection, every font I've made in one download.
Give your game a voice in Voltwire.
Related reading
The thinking behind this
Longer write-ups on the craft this font draws on.
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