I am creating a Hebrew font that imitates the handwriting of an ancient Jewish scribe. I try to adapt the kerning, but I am only able to drag the first letter, and not the second one. I don’t know if this is the reason why the preview and external program (such as Word and InDesign) do not seem to notice the kerning that is saved in FontCreator. Does anyone have a solution?
Please show us a screenshot that illustrates what you are doing in the OpenType Designer dialog.
I couldn’t find how to paste the screen shot here, so I put it on a word document.
It is a Hebrew font, so it is RTL. But I can only drag the right letter, which is the first one. It puts the xposition values in the second letter though. I tried to change the values of the first letter manually. It allowed me to do so, but the preview and external programs still haven’t identified the kerning. It all looked the same as before.
I have attached the screenshot here.
You need to fix two things:
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Do change the script language to Default.
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In your case one or more pairs have a value for the first one. For all pairs ensure all values for the first are set to zero. Then the warning will disappear and the font will work as expected.
Let us know your results.
P.s. the warning text is correct, but the labels above the value columns should swap First and Second for RTL. We will have it fixed in a future release.
Thank you for your reply!
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Do you mean to change the script language in the kerning screen on the left where it is now defined as Hebrew (hbr)>Hebrew (IWR)?
If I’ll do that, will I have to do all the kerning again from scratch or will I be able to use the pairs I have already done? -
The warning only appeared after I manually changed the values of the first letter for one pair to see if it works. Before that all values were set to zero, I had no warning, but the kerning didn’t work.
I changed the script into default, but nothing has changed. I can only drag the right letter.
Yes, just right-click “Hebrew (IWR)” and select Change Tag to set it to Default.
This is not what I suggested, as you now have two Scripts, and Hebrew language is still not changed to Default. It is perfectly legal to have both pointing to the very same kern feature, so:
Default (DFLT) → Default → Kerning1 → PairAdjustment1
Hebrew (hebr) → Default → Kerning1 → PairAdjustment1
Is this what you meant (like in the attachment)?
I right clicked on the “Hebrew (IWR)”, selected change tag, and changed it to default. I also set all the first values to zero. But still can only drag the right letter.
That is how it is supposed to work.
I also notice kerning is now working as expected in the Preview.
Thank you! It now works well on the Preview and on Word. But on InDesign it joins the two letters on the expense of the relation to the previous letter. So, the first letter gets closer to the second letter, but further apart from the previous letter.
It is much more convenient for everyone if you attach screenshots as an image. Anyone can then follow the discussion without opening Word or LibreOffice.
Take a Screenshot in Microsoft Windows.
I take dozens of screenshots nearly every day, so I use FastStone Capture (version 5.3 is freeware and adequate for most use-cases). It loads with Windows and takes very little RAM when not actually in use. Alt+Printscreen will capture the current window from any application. Images are usually smallest and sharpest when saved in PNG format. (Use JPG for photographs, but PNG for dialogs or screenshots that are mostly text).
I have no problem taking the screenshots, but I couldn’t find a way to paste them in the forum. Is there a way to paste them instead of saving them as image files and then attaching them here?
You have to save them to disk first, but don’t you have to save a Word document to disk first before being able to attach it?