First Pixel Font

[jmdesigns]

Good morning, I have just finished the main part of my first pixel font (With many thanks to Kemie of http://www.pixilate.com). I am looking for a few kind souls to check out the following link and let me know if everything looks right to them. (No fill-ins, everything looks sharp, etc..)

http://www.johnmilleker.com/temp/pxlfonttest.html
(Flash MX)

Thank you!
-John

[jmdesigns]

Hmmmmm, after looking at the fonts on a different computer, the small spaces in the characters are filling in.. (the 4 and &) Usually a correct paths fixes this, but not in this case apparently.

I will continue to play with the problem. Other than that, are they showing up clear to everyone?

Thanks!

[jcsco0]

sorry, but it's fuzzy.

[jmdesigns]

Hmmmm, very weird. Once I did view it on a CRT at home (we have LCD's at work - they show even good pixel fonts as being a bit blurry ) I did notice that everything except the bottom 'Font created by...' was indeed blurry.

Opening up my FLA I found that the text fields were converted to something strange. I think they were resized by accident and while still on a whole pixel they blurred up.

Either way, I recreated the FLA and everything looks good on my CRT and (better quality) LCD here at home.

If I can bother you and a few others to check it out and let me know I would be appreciative! Unless its something with my monitors, they are nice and sharp now!

http://www.johnmilleker.com/temp/pxlfonttest.html

Thanks for the feedback!
-John

[wcoleman]

It appears to be acting like a well-behaved pixel font (my test, even if it doesn't look blurry to these old eyes, is to change the quality to low while viewing and see if the font changes dramatically - this one doesn't).

Cheers,

Flick

[jmdesigns]

Excellent! Thank you!

Thats a great idea on how to check pixel fonts, I'm gunna have to save that one!

I'm going to continue and finalize the font, and when its done i'll post the link here just in case anyone wants it.

Thanks again!
-John

[jcsco0]

Not fuzzy! Hooray! And its a good font too!

[kemie]

jm, thanks for aaaaaallllll the credit!
good font! a bit of retro, but still quite usable!

[jmdesigns]

Thanks for the input Jcs!

Kemie, Had it not been your help I'd probablly still be trying to use a size 10 font as a size 8 one!

And theres nothing wrong with retro - If I could run flash on my C64 I would!

Thanks again for the help!

Guess I should get back to working on my site so I can distribute it.

-John

[gecko2]

I'm interested in creating fonts, can anyone give me the basics of making them please?

[jmdesigns]

Gecko, if you plan to use Fontographer, take a look at the following tutorial:

http://www.atomicmedia.net/make.php

This will get you started, there are some speed bumps along the way but if you have any questions dont forget to ask!

-John

[jmdesigns]

I have put both the Commodore 64 font, and a new font (Nokia) online (See URL below). If anyone tries these out I would love to hear feedback on the ease of use of these and/or suggestions as I am still new in this game.

This time I have checked the fonts and site using multiple monitors and found out what ones to trust. Hopefully it will not pose a problem again.

Enjoy!

John
http://www.johnmilleker.com

[jcsco0]

Dude! I love those fonts! They work perfectly with flash. Congratulations. Keep at it!

[wcoleman]

Nicely done! I tested some multi-line text and it worked great in Flash but when I tried it in Swish there were some problems with Commodore 64 - see http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/F...ore64test.html (includes comparisons with other good pixel fonts including nokia). However, if I change the vertical spacing on the text to 5 in Swish (for Commodore 64 only) it looks great - http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/F...re64test2.html

Just thought you might like to know what to tell Swish users if they complain that it doesn't work for them.

Cheers,

Flick

[gecko2]

Can anyone tell me where I can get a copy of Fontographer?

[jcsco0]

Originally posted by wcoleman
Nicely done! I tested some multi-line text and it worked great in Flash but when I tried it in Swish there were some problems with Commodore 64 - see http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/F...ore64test.html (includes comparisons with other good pixel fonts including nokia). However, if I change the vertical spacing on the text to 5 in Swish (for Commodore 64 only) it looks great - http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/F...re64test2.html

Just thought you might like to know what to tell Swish users if they complain that it doesn't work for them.

Cheers,

Flick

That's a useful thing to know. thanks.

[jmdesigns]

Thanks for the input! I'm glad the fonts are working out good..

WC: I have downloaded the trial of Swish and am playing with the C64 font. Swish is a bit different to me and I am getting the hang of it, but is there a possibility you can send me your commodore64test.swi (swish) source file?

I have tried my hand at re-creating your test in Swish and believe I *may* have corrected the Commodore64 font but I want to be sure. (Created two text boxes, one on V Line Spacing at 0 and 5 - saw the difference. Then 'corrected' C64 and tried the same movie agin - the problem has appeared to clear up.)

As for the settings, I am guessing that once the text field is in Swish, I set the registration point to Top Left and set it on whole pixels as in flash. Of course make sure left justify is on and go from there.

Thanks for the info, I will now test these files in Swish (as I do know that Swish does have a huge user base).

I know these fonts are probablly not perfect in every way and there are probablly lots of things I will learn with each new creation, but hey, thats what version numbers are for!

-John

[wcoleman]

John,

The swi is at http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/F...dore64test.swi - it will require the most recent build of Swish 2 available at http://www.swishzone.com/SetupSwish200_20020726.exe

Cheers,

Flick

(who has fond memories of his Commodore 64 (actually 8 of them in a lab))

[jmdesigns]

Flick, thanks for the link however I am having some problems getting the file. I am getting a page not found error.

I have been playing with trying to re-create it on my side, I have uploaded a zip file with my new font (C64 v1.1), C64_Test.swi, C64_Test.swf, and C64_Test.html file. I still think I have the problem fixed and may even understand whats happening. Perhaps a few more test laps through the Fontographer manual can confirm this.

Located here: http://www.johnmilleker.com/temp/c64swish.zip

If you or anyone else gets a few moments to test out the new font that would be great!

I have also noticed a few things in Swish (and flash) when testing Pixel Fonts.. In Swish especially I was using your 'change to low quality' trick to see if the font was displaying correctly. This usually causes a few lines to space down another pixel, or causes the whole text box to step over by a pixel.

Looking at your original test, I noticed that even though the pixel fonts looked great (other than C64 1.0) they shifted when viewed at low-quality. Will this usually happen and only the clarity of the font should be observed?

I did notice that flash does this as well, but if I publish the movie with Left/Top alignment in the HTML options I can get rid of the shift. So I am guessing that usually things will shift when switched to low-quality, but as long as a font itself does not get worse at 100% view everything is still ok.

Thank you!

-John

[wcoleman]

John - I will upload the files again when I get home - the one for the swi for the second file is there but not the first one - sorry about that.

Even pixel fonts that look great in a swf movie do shift a little when the quality is changed and I agree with you that clarity is the test rather than small positional changes.

Cheers,

Flick