The fonts and colours available to you when you create a story in the Shorthand editor are set by the story theme. By default, all users have access to one or more standard themes which provide a limited selection of fonts and colours that have been chosen to work well together.

You can choose available themes from the THEMES tab in the top left of the editor:

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The theme you select will set the fonts and colours that are easily accessible for the story you have open in the editor.

You may have access to, or wish to set up, a custom branded theme that incorporates specific fonts and colours as well as your logo and other unique styling.

The various sections that make up your story have multiple methods for changing the colours and fonts that are automatically applied to other colours and fonts that are available from the theme.

Most themes have two default colour choices for story sections, usually defined as "LIGHT" and "DARK". You can switch between these through the section options shown when clicking the little cog icon next to a section thumbnail image in the editor. This is the fastest and easiest way to choose between pre-defined colours as the choice applies to all the type and colour in the section.

Along with the pre-defined options, depending on the theme, you may see a small paintbrush icon in the section options panel. It allows for other choices of colour that will be applied to all the text and/or background of the section:

If you wish to change the colour of only some of the text in a section (rather than all the text in the section), then you can do so by highlighting the text and selecting the paintbrush icon to choose from the colours available in your theme.

If your plan allows for it, along with the colours of your theme, it's possible to add other colours to the palette. Unlike theme colours, which are available to any of your stories using the same theme, these new colours will be available only in the palette of the story you are currently working on.

To add new colours to the palette, open the section options panel for the section you are currently working on by clicking the small cog icon next to the section thumbnail on the left side of the screen:

…then choose the paintbrush icon in the COLOURS segment of the panel, and click the + icon under the heading "STORY COLOURS":

A colour picker will open, from which you can choose colours using the gradient panel and sliders, or into which you can enter a HEX or RGBA colour code.

After adding colours to your palette, they are available throughout each of the sections of the story you are working on.

To remove custom colours from your palette, click the EDIT button next to colours in the Section Options panel, click the colour you wish to remove, and then "DELETE COLOUR" in the gradient panel:

Any custom colour you have added can be edited. So, for instance, if you have added a light blue to your story and used it to colour text and background elements in several sections, editing the light blue colour in the palette such that it is then purple, will change all the light blue elements in your story to now use the purple colour instead.

New colours can also be added from anywhere else in the editor that you can currently see the colour palette: for instance by clicking the paintbrush icon after highlighting some text, or choosing to edit an inline button or horizontal rule.

The fonts from your chosen theme can be applied at a block level, using the same interface used to select the block text style:

If your theme only supports a single font and you wish to have access to more, please contact us.

By using developer tools to add custom CSS to the story, it's possible to override elements of the theme, including specifying alternate or additional fonts and colours.

Be aware that custom CSS is an option only in some plans, and that applying incorrect CSS code could adversely affect the story.