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U
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YOUR OWN FONTS
Font design is tedious
A warning: font design is an art. Don't expect to turn out professional-
lookingfonts in a few hours.
Sometimes,though,youhaveto buildyourowntypeface,evenif youdon't
work with a companyin the font-sellingbusiness.You may, for example,
want to print your own customizedcompanylogo. It means buildingup
characterswithina cell or grid,perhaps50 dotshigh and 35 wide—lots of
dots.
Because defining your own typeface is so tedious, make sure you've
checked out as many downloadablefonts as you can find from font
developmentcompanies.
The next handiestway to do the job is to ask around,maybe where you
boughtyourLaserPrinter8, to see if youcan get one of the font-creatingor
font-editingutilityprogramsnowon themarket.FontGen[V+is one.Keep
aneyeout,too,fornewwordprocessingtoolsthatmightsaveyouthetrouble
of painstakinglyfiguringout detailslike kerning.
Even with aids like these,buildinga customfont is an intricateprocess.It
calls for the creationof a familyof up to 200 characterssharinga common
designand proportionalscheme,and that'sjust for onc type size.No mean
feat. '
How to download your own fonts
Charactersthat you define and store yourself are called "user-defined"
characters.Let'sassumeyoualreadyknowwhattextis to be in yourcustom
font, and havedesignedits typeface,weight,widthand style.Onceyou've
created your own characters,you'llneed to downloadthem to your laser
printer.
The processof downloadinga font you'vedesignedyourselfis somewhat
detailed.To downloadyour font,you followthe followingsteps:
1)
assigna font ID numberto your font,
2)
downloada font header,
3)
identifythe positionof each characterto be downloaded,
4)
senda characterdescriptorand bit map for each character,
5)
specifywhetherthe file is to be permanentor temporary.
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