Making Transparent Fonts

[Ghachii]

Hello,

I'm new to making fonts, although I do have experience with other vector software such as Illustrator, so I'm familiar with the general concepts. I'm trying to determine the most effective method of making a font appear partially-transparent. Specifically, I need my font to appear grey with a black outline (at least on a white background).

I've seen this sort of thing done in various fonts I've downloaded in the past, and I'd assumed that the technique must be relatively straightforward - some fonts even seem to have a gradient, rather than just a simple transparency. I've opened these fonts and examined them in FontCreator, and it seems that the 'transparency' is actually achieved with vast numbers of microscopic vector shapes, creating the illusion of transparency at low point sizes.

For me, this raises 3 questions:

1) Is this actually how the original authors achieved the transparency, or is it a result of FontCreator's import process?

2) Is there a quick way of generating this effect, without spending the next 10 years of my life drawing microscopic vector shapes?

3) Is there a more efficient method of achieving transparency (or at least the illusion of transparency) that I haven't considered, either in FontCreator or elsewhere?


Thanks very much for your time and consideration,

Jamie.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

Its better to apply the transparency (or bitmap fills) in a drawing application.

Lots of small contours will cause all sorts of problems in fonts at small sizes — especially without hinting. A larger pattern is viable.

See New Fonts from Old

[William]

Its better to apply the transparency (or bitmap fills) in a drawing application.

Yes, that is straightforward to do using suitable software.

I have just made the following graphic using DrawPlus Starter Edition, which is a free starter program from Serif. One needs to register, yet the software is free.

sonnet.png (22.76 KiB) Viewed 4933 times

I used the Artistic Text facility and made the line black at 100% opacity and the fill grey at 50% opacity. I added the quickshape circle, set the line and fill colours and then arranged it behind the letters so as to show the transparent effect of the fill of the letters.

http://www.serif.com/FreeDownloads/

The font that I used to make the graphic is my Sonnet to a Renaissance Lady font, which is available from the Gallery forum of the High-Logic webspace.

William Overington

26 August 2011