Program for creating png font. Review of the best programs for working with fonts

A lot has been written about type design, especially the history of its creation. We have read about many techniques for creating fonts. But where exactly should you start? If you are a designer or illustrator and this discipline is new to you, where do you start?

We found useful information that we collected from many sources, and decided to put it all together.

1. Start with a brief

Creating a font is a long and painstaking job, so it is very important to have a clear understanding of what this font should be.

Developing a brief will certainly require research and thought. How will your font be used: will it be for a specific project or for personal use? Is there a problem your font would solve? Will your font fit into an array of similar designs? What makes it unique?

There are many options. Fonts can be created, for example, specifically for academic texts or for posters. Only when you know how your font can be used are you ready to start designing.

2. Fundamental choice

There are a number of decisions to keep in mind. Will it be sans-serif or serif? Will it be based on handwriting or will it be more geometric? Will the font be made for text and suitable for long documents? Or maybe it will display text in a creative style and look better in large size?

Clue: It is assumed that the design of sans serif font is more difficult for beginners, since the possibilities of such fonts are more specific.

3. Pitfalls in the early stages

There are several pitfalls:

You may decide to start by computerizing handwriting, which can be a useful practice exercise. But because handwriting is so individual, your typeface might not do well because of its specificity.
You should not take existing fonts as a basis. Reworking a font that is already familiar to everyone a little, you will not create a better font and will not develop your skills.

4. Use your hands

There is a lot of material on how to draw fonts with computer programs, but we strongly recommend that you draw it by hand first. Trying to do this on a computer will make your job much more difficult.

Try to create beautiful shapes of the first few letters on paper, and only then start computer work. Subsequent letters can then be constructed from existing shapes, according to key features.

Clue: By hand, you can usually draw smoother, more precise curves. To make it more convenient, don't be afraid to turn the sheet of paper the way you want.

5. What characters to start with

Creating certain characters first can help you style your font. Well, then these characters will be used as guides. Usually “control characters”, as they are called, in Latin are n and o, and capitals are H and O. Often the word adhension is used, which will help test the basic proportions of the font (but, some write this word as adhencion, because the letter s can be very tricky).

6. We transfer the font to the computer

There are many ways to transfer a drawing to a computer. Some recommend tracing programs, but many prefer to do this work manually so that they have full control over the points and shapes.

Many programs need a clear and bright drawing, so once you like your font, circle it with a fine pen and fill in the shapes with a marker.

Clue: If you have processed the drawn font as described above, then you can simply take a photo of the drawing and work with it.

7. Program selection

Many designers like to use Adobe Illustrator. For drawing individual shapes and experimenting, it is great. But later it becomes obvious that it is not suitable for creating fonts. You'll want to work with a program that lets you work with letter spacing and create words.

A great program is FontLab Studio, but newer software like Glyphs and Robofont are getting more and more popular. These programs are not cheap, but Glyghs has a “mini” version in the Mac App Store with some missing features, which is not good because those features are important for newbies.

8. Use of programs

Don't forget to position the extreme points of the letter shapes (top, bottom, right, left) to better control the process.

9. Words

When you have finished all the smoothing of the shapes, see how it looks in full text. Make it your goal to analyze how the font looks in a line, paragraph, and so on. And don't wait until you make the whole alphabet.

One of the most popular font design software. Available on Windows and Mac.

The program is available on Windows, has an intuitive interface and is great for beginners.

Another powerful font editor from FontLab that allows you to create new fonts or modify existing ones. Available on Windows and Mac.

This program runs on Windows, Mac, Unix/Linux and has been translated into many languages. It also allows you to create new fonts and edit existing ones.

OpenType font editor, available on Windows and Mac OS X. Quite simple and contains a fair amount of features.

Another free tool with which you can create dot fonts.

A free trial ($9 per font download) online tool that lets you create fonts from handwritten text.

Another online tool (also almost $10 to download) that lets you create a font from handwritten text.

A free and fairly powerful font editor. Great for beginners and those who do not want to spend money on buying programs.

This app is available on iPad and Windows 8. It allows you to create a font from a sketch and edit existing fonts.

Free limited time tool. With it, you can create fonts and download them.

A free online tool that allows you to create TTF and OTF fonts from handwritten text.

There is a free and premium version. The program runs on Windows, Linux, Mac OS X and BSD.

They are divided into two categories:

to create new headsets;
for quick search and selection of the desired font for a particular project.

Graphists will be interested to know which software is more convenient and faster to design and manage headsets, so we will analyze the most popular software in a professional environment.

The simplest and most well-known program in which it is easy to create not only vector drawings, but also a font. You can draw letters immediately on the working field, or scan (take a picture) of the sketch and circle it with any convenient tool - Bezier curve, Pen, etc. It is important to remember that the number of points should be minimal, otherwise the characters will turn out to be somewhat clumsy (outline can be corrected by taking a special arrow that edits curves).

After all the characters have been drawn, you need to transfer one of them to a new document, click "File" - "Export to ..." and select the font type (True Type, Open Type or Type 1). A window will appear where you need to specify the name of the headset, and leave the rest of the settings the same. In the next window, you need to associate the letter with the corresponding key. Save each character separately and collect them in a shared folder. After that, the font can be installed into the system in the usual way. This program is suitable for creating decorative fonts - for Old Style, chopped, with different styles, the development process is too complicated and lengthy.

Another program for professional work with fonts. If you are creating typefaces for speed reading, which will be used for typing solid text, it is better to use this particular software. As soon as you start FontCreator and create a new file, a settings window will appear: enter the name of the typeface, type of outline (Bold - bold, Regular - standard, Italic - thin) and check the box that prohibits the creation of a free outline.

Next, you will see a table of symbols and English letters (to switch to Cyrillic, click "Insert" - "Symbols" - "OK", select some standard font and change Unicode to Cyrillic). Now it's time to load the prepared letter sketch, use the tools to convert it to curves and export it to .ttf format. Letter drawings can be designed in Adobe Illustrator if desired, and generated in FontCreator.

This program is used to create and edit fonts, as well as save them in the correct format. The working field is adapted for the most accurate work with letters: you can draw them right here, or import an image and draw on it. The design principle is almost the same as in previous programs.

The most famous software among designers who specialize in creating new typefaces. For full-fledged work, you will have to buy a license (the demo version does not allow you to generate the entire alphabet into .ttf format), but designing fonts here is simple and very convenient. Load a pre-stored sketch of letters, trace it (“Tools” - “Background” - “Trace”) and click “File” - “Generate Font”. The program will process all characters at once, which distinguishes it from Corel draw and others. To make the letters beautiful, you can combine the advantages of different applications. For example, draw glyphs in a graphical editor, and export already in FontLab Studio.

Managers

The next type of software exists to manage font sets that are already loaded into the system. When creating, for example, an advertising banner, it is very inconvenient to select typefaces directly in the graphic editor, especially when there are a lot of them. And here managers come to the rescue, which we will discuss below.

Lightweight application that can be run directly from external media. The interface is very simple: on the left you see folders with all available fonts, and on the right, in a large field, examples of writing. You can change the text to your own and see how it looks in different variations and styles.

An interesting program that can select a similar headset. Just take a screenshot of the inscription typed in the font you like and import it into the working field - you will be offered all the similar typefaces that are available in the sets. You can also sort the collections according to a certain attribute, for example, “notched”, “chopped”, “thin”, “handwritten”, etc.

Software that keeps your system from being cluttered with various fonts that you don't plan to use often. Instead of installing, drag the typeface to the FonTemp field and do not close the window until the project is completed - the graphic editor will temporarily display it in the general list.

IMPORTANT. Don't forget to convert the text to curves before exiting the program - otherwise the font will be replaced the next time you open the project.

MyFontbook

An online utility to view installed headsets and sort them by quality criteria. The good thing is that it does not require downloading, installation and storage on some media.

When working with graphics, especially in printing, you almost always need to deal with fonts. Hundreds of fonts on the computer, thousands - on the Internet. Paid, free, serif, sans-serif, Cyrillic, decorative, grotesque, stylized - it's easy to drown in the variety of fonts, and it's almost impossible to remember everything. Moreover, most of them are rarely used. This is where font managers come to the rescue. There are also quite a few of them - from simple viewers to powerful managers that provide many opportunities. In this article, we will look at several effective free font managers.

Fast Font Preview

This is a very simple utility that allows you to quickly view the fonts installed on your system. For greater convenience, the standard test phrase can be replaced with your own. It is noteworthy that the program can work portable. Actually, the possibilities of FastFontPreview end there. But often, that's all it takes. You can download FastFontPreview.

font viewer

The Font Viewer program works similarly. For more convenience, you can customize the font color, size and background. You can also save your favorite fonts to lists for quick access in the future and export your list of fonts to a txt or pdf file.

FontMassive

Incredibly powerful program included in the FontMassive Pack series. The program is offered in paid and free versions. The list of its features is impressive:

Display fonts as a list.
Symbol table.
Distribution of font files into folders.
Installing fonts in the system.
Removing fonts from the system
Working with formats: TrueType (.ttf), OpenType (.otf), PostScript Type1 (.pfm + .pfb).
View fonts without installation from any source (folders, CD/DVD-ROM, network environment).
Character-by-character comparison of similar fonts.
Very fast list filling (you can already work with the list while it continues to fill up).
Opening subfolders. For example, when dragging from Explorer, hold down Ctrl.
A large number of sorting options (for example, by text width - helps to visually find similar fonts).
Copying styles in curves in .
Viewing a symbol in curves.
Folder history.
Own folder tree.
Work without installation.

FontDetect

The eternal problem - the client asks to write “in such a font”, of course, he does not remember the name. Searching for a similar style with a simple search can take a lot of time and end up with nothing. The FontDetect utility included with the FontMassive Pack helps solve this problem. Program features:

"Probing" fonts in a given list for similarity with the image.
Sort by the most similar to the image.
Very fast search.
Built-in mini-editor (or rather, corrector) of the image.
Ability to work independently (without FontMassive).
The search occurs among all font files specified by the user.

FonTemp

Having a large number of fonts on a computer is a production necessity. But with each new font, the load on the graphic editor and the search time among the many unused options also increase. The FonTemp program from the FontMassive Pack allows you to make a tricky move. You can temporarily "install" the font while the program is running, or you can create an array of the desired fonts. At the end of the work, the system will no longer "see" them. In general, FonTemp can do the following:

Installing fonts "for temporary use" regardless of their location (at least on a local network).
The system is not "overloaded" with a large number of permanently installed fonts (besides, it is limited).
The System's limitation on the number of installed fonts is due to the limited maximum size of keys in the Registry.
When the program is closed (or restarted), the fonts are no longer installed (visible by all programs).
List of Sets and a list of fonts from each set.
Labels for "temporarily off this temporary list" :).
The number of created sets is not limited.
Convenient call from FontMassive (first select the fonts in FM and open the context menu of the list).
Ability to work independently (without the entire FontMassive Pack).
Minimize to tray (“by the clock”).

NexusFont

NexusFont is in many ways similar to the above programs. This handy application, in addition to viewing, installing and deleting fonts, also allows you to work with fonts only while the program is running. You can combine fonts into all sorts of groups for greater convenience, as well as remove duplicates, even if they have different names.

The portability of NexusFont is also an undoubted advantage. You can run the program from a flash drive on any computer and still use all the variety of fonts you have.

FontFrenzy

Let's say you decide to use a program to temporarily connect fonts and clean the system to its original state. But how to remove all unnecessary and not touch the system fonts? A simple FontFrenzy program comes to the rescue. It will quickly put things in order in your system, and all the "extra" fonts can be put into a separate folder, from where you can always restore them.

FontNet Explorer

Each designer has their own list of bookmarks with font sites. But searching for the right one on a variety of sites can take a lot of time. FontNet Explorer is a font browser that will do the search for the desired font for you on an impressive database of specialized sites. It is noteworthy that the program does not require installation.

MyFontbook

And, finally, if you are far from your computer and there is no flash drive with your font manager at hand, but you urgently need to find the right option, then use MyFontbook. This online application will show all your fonts, sort them by tags (if you have created them) and allow you to quickly view the desired phrase.

By choosing the software you need and putting things in order in the font folder, you can significantly simplify and speed up the creation of your design projects.

Installing fonts "for temporary use" regardless of their location (at least over the network).
The system is not "overloaded" with a large number of permanently installed fonts (besides, it is limited).
When the program is closed (or restarted), the fonts are no longer installed (visible by all programs).
List of Sets and a list of fonts from each set.
Labels for "temporarily off this temporary list" :).
The number of created sets is not limited.
Convenient call from FontMassive (first select the fonts in FM and open the context menu of the list).
Ability to work independently (without the entire FontMassive Pack).
Working with the command line.
Minimize to tray (“to the clock”).

★★★★★

Free Font Renamer

Program for renaming collections of fonts. Usually font files are named abbreviated and it is not entirely clear which one is where. This program can batch rename all files, including subfolders (if we want), returning them to their original names. Free Font Renamer can also remove spaces from font names if needed. All fonts located in the Windows system folder will be ignored.

Nexus Font

Manager for managing fonts in the Windows system.
It is possible to display written text using different fonts.

The application supports TrueType, OpenType and Adobe Type1 font formats. NexusFont is also very useful for installing and removing fonts, finding duplicates, renaming and so on. It is also possible to export the preview window as an image.
This is very useful if you need a font to be confirmed by a client or colleagues.

At the moment, there is a huge number of a wide variety of fonts, however, some users may want to create some of their own, completely unique designs. Fortunately, in our time, it is not at all necessary to have the skill of calligraphy for this, because there are a fairly large number of specialized programs designed to facilitate this process.

X-Fonter is not designed to create your own fonts. She, in fact, is an advanced manager that allows you to better navigate among the many sets installed on your computer.

Also in X-Fonter there is a tool for creating simple compact banners.

type

Type is a great tool for creating your own fonts. Allows you to draw characters of almost any complexity through the use of tools available in the built-in set. Among those are straight lines, splines and basic geometric objects.

In addition to the standard method of creating symbols described above, Type has the ability to manually program them using the command window.

scanahand

Scanahand stands out from the rest due to the way it works with fonts. To create your own font here, you need to print the prepared table, fill it in manually with a marker or pen, and then scan it and load it into the program.

This font maker is best for people with calligraphy skills.

font creator

FontCreator is a program developed by High-Logic. It, like Scanahand, provides the ability to create your own unique fonts. However, unlike the previous solution, FontCreator does not require any additional hardware such as a scanner and printer.

In general, this program is similar in its functionality to Type, because it uses approximately the same set of tools.

Font Forge

Another tool for creating your own and editing ready-made fonts. It has almost the same set of functions as FontCreator and Type, but it is completely free.

The main disadvantage of FontForge is a rather inconvenient interface, divided into many separate windows. However, despite this, this program occupies one of the leading positions among similar solutions for creating fonts.

The above programs will help you better interact with different fonts. All of them, except perhaps X-Fonter, have many useful features for creating your own fonts.