Handles, Béziers & Points

[Fabiouser]

Its that think I like here: Put ignition on fire and have meal of it.

Cubic Béziers? Quadratic Béziers? Wikipedia have a really formal article on that theme; but mathematics aspects have to much emphasis… Like @Ryan said all curves are psychological.

Mathematics help us to forget psychological problems?

[hrant]

Math? It's as real for us as the burin & file and workability of steel were for punchcutters.

modifier keys

One more - a personal fav: Alt-Shift-clicking on a curve (or even a line) creates "balanced" BCPs... although you really only want to do that to auto-add a BCP to a "half-dead" curve (which you might still have to tweak though).

hhp

[Fabiouser]

Leslie Cabarga referes all that keys in the book I mention before. Great book

[Ryan Maelhorn]

I doubt many of us are doing math. Anybody find themselves typing in the formula for a super ellipse lately?

I think what fabiouser is getting at is that there is a place where metrics can overpower expression, and vice versa.

[Ryan Maelhorn]

Here's another editing idea: highlight the entire outline, showing all control points, and allow us to select all, or any lesser combination of the control points.

Usually you can only edit control points that are connected to a single node. even if you select all the nodes in an outline, once you click on any control point, your control gets limited to that point only, so no complex selection groups are capable.

[Ryan Maelhorn]

Yep, Quadratic B-splines (2nd-order curves), is what I was talking about:

So much easier to work with. Wish all vector editors could use them.

The illustration here shows it with only one off curve control point between the 2 nodes, but you can put many more inbetween there.

Also, just checking, there is no way to work with quadratic curves in fontlab when editing open type fonts, correct?

[hrant]

So much easier to work with.

Just FYI the great majority of people seem to prefer cubic béziers.

BTW could this be why your fonts are -what I see as- wobbly?
(Where's that thread where I was comparing your "o" to one that I like?)

hhp

[cuttlefish]

I don't know about Fontlab, but FontForge allows you to choose between working with cubic or quadratic bezier splines, and also euler spiral segments (my preferred method, but that's a different animal that has to be converted to beziers to output a usable font). I do pity the fool who attempts to install FF. Give it a few weeks as it's undergoing a major rebuild.

Dammit there I go threadjacking again.

But anyway, my point is that there is a font editor that lets you draw with quadratic splines if you choose to do so. Seems like a pain to me, but that's what some others think of Spiro mode, so who am I to say…

[Ryan Maelhorn]

why in the world does it still take at least a basic programming course to know how to install Font Forge? This is 2012. Ridiculous..

[Ryan Maelhorn]

BTW could this be why your fonts are -what I see as- wobbly?
(Where's that thread where I was comparing your "o" to one that I like?)

Interesting, and a good catch. I would say that a lot of the wobbliness is due to the classic cubic spline setup, actually.

Though I prefer to build in Quadratic now, it wasn't always this way. I started off with the standard cubic spline and editing mode of the default adobe illustrator install, as I would guess most here have. Pretty much all my work that is out there was made in the cubic world.

I see quadratic as a way to remove the wobliness, actually. When I want to anyway. There is still something to be said for something that looks like it was done by hand and is not perfect, especially in todays digital world.

[Fabiouser]

Anybody find themselves typing in the formula for a super ellipse lately?
I think what fabiouser is getting at is that there is a place where metrics can overpower expression, and vice versa.

@Ryan That's the point!

[hrant]

Wash your mouth out - I do not make art.

hhp

[Ryan Maelhorn]

I'll quote you on that. :D

[Ryan Maelhorn]

Well, Math, and what we are really talking about here, Counting, are ultimately abstractions. For that is their utility. That is what Counting is. A system of abstracting or reducing more complex information into a more easily manageable set. And data points entered into that system.

So in art, unlike as in science, measurement will always take a subservient role to what i conveniently call the "psychological intent" of the curve.

[cuttlefish]

re: why in the world does it still take at least a basic programming course to know how to install Font Forge?

That is a damn good question.

[Fabiouser]

I think I find something that have a close relation with my original question.

It seems like the handles have some logic in that perspective…just like I point in the original question I made.
Thanks @rs_donsata to remind me that book!

[Fabiouser]

@hrant I think too that typography isn't art. I think that sometimes we need a little of subjectiveness.

THE SHAPES OF LETTERS
The shapes of letters do not derive their beauty from any sensual or sentimental reminiscences. No one can say that the O's roundness appeals to us only because it is like that of an apple or of a girl's breast or of the full moon. Letters are things, not pictures of things.
—Eric Gill, Autobiography, Jonathan Cape, London, 1940.

Even knowing that letters are not pictures of things.

[Luma Vine]

Is anyone else thinking that those guides all over the /S picture above are typical post rationalization? I am not really seeing the relationships they are trying to highlight, rather it looks like they found some points that happen to be almost in line and connected the dots. This is actually a much more useful version of such an idea: http://dribbble.com/shots/446385--s-construction

[Luma Vine]

Looking again, I see they included such a disclaimer. However isn't the intersection in the middle of the /O just because it has strong symmetry? A perfect circle would exhibit this characteristic, but I doubt anyone here would say that a perfect circle is a good /O.

[ahyangyi]

@Ryan:

I don't think you need any programming knowledge to install FontForge.
FontForge is shitty anyway. But I have seen very active development in recent days. Maybe it could be a bit stabler in the future...

[Fabiouser]

@Luma Vine; no one is talking about if you use that way, you get the perfect character. Is just a way of seeing things that could make some sense (or not)

[dberlowgone]

"I am not really seeing the relationships they are trying to highlight"

And yet, they so often exist.

"However isn't the intersection in the middle of the /O just because it has strong symmetry? "

Yes.

"A perfect circle would exhibit this characteristic, but I doubt anyone here would say that a perfect circle is a good /O."

If you look at the difference between this and the intersecting post-rationizations of a perfectly circular O, you'll see the differences are the difference between this O and a perfectly circular O.

"Just FYI the great majority of people seem to prefer cubic béziers."

Just FYI, the great majority of people have only ever worked with cubic béziers. So a "preference" for any-such only-thing they've ever worked with, is little more that a Hrantaggeration in the greater scheme of better things.

[hrant]

It's certainly true that deep cubic habits aren't happy being moved to quadratic (human nature) and cubic had a big head-start, so maybe it's not possible to do a fair comparison. But that doesn't mean I'm wrong. :-)

hhp

[dberlowgone]

"...aren't happy being moved..."

And to whom has this happened? do you ever read what you write, think about it, and then edit it?

[hrant]

You really haven't heard anybody complain that working with quadratics is more of a pain? I admit I haven't heard it as much lately* but it used to be a common refrain. Now, are there occasional technical advantages? Of course, and nobody wants to rely [too much] on an automatic conversion from cubics.

* Which I have to wonder why. Is it because people got used to it? Maybe.

Re-read what I write? Every time. Think about it? People accuse me of thinking too much. Edit my mistakes? Only if I had a time machine - otherwise it's cheating. :-)

hhp