A question from a newbie.

Subpath

...Exporting to a font is not available in VS (and it is not on the roadmap for version 2, maybe after...

When I reading this thread, that was exactly my thought. Came up with it because in Coreldraw
you could export vector graphics as .TTF (TrueTypeFont Format).

My Idea was:
Since multiple artboards are possible in VS, these could be the base in which the letters
could be created. And finally export everything as one font file.

In my last job I often exported graphical designs into a font file (.ttf) and exported them.
However, in that case with the help of a font editor. Because a printing machine could
print vector graphics designs only in form of font characters.

FanVidder

Absolutely, I remembered that CorelDraw does have the capacity to export fonts. I thought that seeing as the Glyphs panel is a feature of Vectorstyler, could exporting TTF or OTF's be added to VS later on.

Subpath

For anyone who is interested, here are two Font Editors
one "Fontforge" (Win) is free, the other one "Birdfont"
(Win, Linux, Mac OS X) is Donation ware.

Here the Links:
Fontforge Homepage

Birdfont Homepage

b77

@Subpath I can't say I recommend FontForge — you can't paste anything from VS into it and looks like it's not really developed anymore (no new features), only mantained to still run on new OSes.

@FanVidder Look at the commercial apps if font design is something you need — TypeTool and Glyphs Mini are much cheaper than FontLab and Glyphs, and provide an upgrade path if you need the full capabilities of these apps down the road.

@VectorStyler An alternative would be if the app would export the artboards into one UFO file which font editors can open and take further. Sometime in the future, of course…

VectorStyler

@b77 said in A question from a newbie.:

An alternative would be if the app would export the artboards into one UFO file which font editors can open and take further. Sometime in the future, of course…

Looking at the specs (https://unifiedfontobject.org) I think this is doable, but maybe further down the road.

Subpath

@b77

... I can't say I recommend FontForge — you can't paste anything from VS ...

Thanks for the info.

Honestly, I have neither worked with nor used "Fontforge".
In my last job I used a commercial font editor, if I remember correctly
the name was "Fontographer". A little ugly, but did the job.

There are also some Online Font Editors.

Subpath

@VectorStyler

No need to rush, I think. There are enough alternatives.

VectorStyler

@Subpath Would batch exporting to separate SVG files help here? Are there tools in font design that could merge batches of SVG vectors?

Subpath

@VectorStyler

...Would batch exporting to separate SVG files help here? Are there tools in font design that could merge batches of SVG vectors?...

Sorry, I don't know how usable that would be after all you would
also need a batch import into the font editor I think.
So far, I am not aware of anything along these lines.
But I'm open to looking around a bit.

Back in Time i used .Ai as export per letter from Corel and
import Letter by Letter in Fontographer.

Corel used .TTF for export without kerning and things like that.
You could then open this TTF file in a font editor for further editing. Kerning ect.

Here is a video about the Corel method.
The Export Options are on 3:20
Video: Corel Method

b77

@VectorStyler Assuming you have a bunch of SVG files with the shapes for A, B, C, etc (A.svg, B.svg, C.svg), Glyphs can batch import them into a new document (File > Import > Outlines) by copying the outlines for 'A' from the A.svg file, the outlines for 'B' from the B.svg file, and so on.

@FanVidder So if you create a VS document with artboards named after the glyphs (A, B, C… a, b, c,… zero, one, two,… period, comma, hyphen), export them all as SVG with File > Export Artboards, and Glyphs will batch import them nicely as described above.

Subpath

@b77

thanks, interesting to know

FanVidder

@b77 Thanks SO MUCH for this. As I said, I've not had VS very long and I'm still finding my way. I find it hard that there's not many tutorial vids out there; as that would REALLY help. Thanks again.

b77

@FanVidder What I described is a pretty specialized area, so you won't find tutorials for it.

Anyway, don't forget to:

create artboards that match the UPM (in Glyphs it's 1000 by default, so make the artboards 1000pt tall);
drag guidelines at least for the baseline (default is at 200pt) and for the ascent line (default is at 900pt).

Btw, there are a few VectorStyler instructional videos here: https://vimeo.com/user95036806