Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

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outofstepfontco
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Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by outofstepfontco »

Hi there
I am looking for some advice on best practice for supplying alternates with a different horizontal stroke (cross bar) height.

For example: a new all-caps gothic grotesque font, the horizontal stroke bounces up and down above and below the horizontal centerline. I put alternate glyphs with centered horizontal strokes in the lower case.

Alternately, I could make three new fonts:
- bar above centerline
- bar below centerline
- bar centered

What do you do? What has worked better for you? What have your clients preferred? I recognize new weights x 3 different font files can make this unwieldy pretty quickly.
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MikeW
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by MikeW »

I would add the alternates to 2 different stylistic sets. That handles all the various layout, vector graphic and most image editing software, as well as Word users.

I also add them to an aalt so that some vector editing software, and now InDesign and some others, one can simply highlight a character and choose an alternative. Each alternate, in your case,2 alternates, are then presented for choosing from for that character(s) when applicable.

If someone is using old(er) software and complains, then I would generate the separate fonts for their use. That hasn't been needed for some time for me. During a transitional period, it was common to generate the OTF = everything version, and break out the others into TTFs. But that's been a long while for me.

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outofstepfontco
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by outofstepfontco »

Can you link me the tutorial on how to make that happen?
My copy of FC8.1 Standard has nothing in the help file, and Google searches haven't come up with anything definitive as of yet.
Seen the Fontself implementation though!

Appreciate it
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MikeW
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by MikeW »

How to make what, or which, happen?

I've never not used a Pro version and so am completely ignorant of the differences, much less back a few versions. If the Standard version doesn't have the OpenType Feature editor, I would encourage you to upgrade. It alone is worth the cost, but there are other reasons to do so as well.
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by Alfred »

MikeW wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2017 1:57 pm If the Standard version doesn't have the OpenType Feature editor, I would encourage you to upgrade.
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MikeW
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by MikeW »

Thanks, Alfred. So then, for an Alternate feature...

I use a spreadsheet to create these, but the Alternate look up is formatted like:

lookup Alternate1 {
sub E -> [E.salt E.swsh E.ss01 E.ss02];
sub F -> [F.salt F.swsh F.ss01 F.ss02];
sub G -> [G.salt G.swsh G.ss01 G.ss02];
sub H -> [H.salt H.swsh H.ss01 H.ss02];
...
}

The manner in which an application presents these alternates vary greatly. The below screen shot is from CorelDraw, which I would argue for a vector design application is best in class.
capture-001574.png
capture-001574.png (18.03 KiB) Viewed 14158 times
outofstepfontco
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by outofstepfontco »

I have access to the OpenType Designer, I can add the Stylistic Alternate and Stylistic Set features, but then the designer gives me mark to base and pair adjustment options. I'll see if I can find any tutorials on the forum. The comparison chart seems to say that the only difference between standard and Professional is Volt projects, and copying vectors to the clipboard.
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Erwin Denissen
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by Erwin Denissen »

I'm not sure what version you use, but this is how it is done in FontCreator 11:
AddLookup.png
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by Bhikkhu Pesala »

The version being used in FC8.1.
outofstepfontco wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2017 5:37 amMy copy of FC8.1 Standard has nothing in the help file, and Google searches haven't come up with anything definitive as of yet.
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outofstepfontco
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Re: Alternates or New Font for cross bar (horizontal stroke) variations

Post by outofstepfontco »

Okay, it looks like I'm out of luck until I upgrade.
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