Hi All, I have put the first release of my rasterized font creator up for download at http://www.codepuppet.com/fontmaker2.html. This application allows you to import a TIF image file created in Photoshop or Paintshop containing font characters and then mark it up for export for use in a game engine. The XML export file contains the font and position information that was marked up and goes together with with an output TGA file which is a compacted version of the original file. The benefit of this over existing rasterized font makers is you can create a font taking advantage of photoshops layer capabilities to add outlines, shadows, bevelling, texturing or anything else to your font. The application works better with an image file that has an alpha map, as when you import into the engine you want to be able to see behind your font (obviously). This also allows you to use the 'intellisize' option which auto-sizes the size box around a particular character by looking for zero alpha values around the outside. This is a first release, so please let me have any comments and suggested improvements. I plan to add a toolbar to make it easier to access the tools and also a kerning table. Thanks Rael

I got it to run, but I needed a DLL. I'm going to link you from the GPWIKI. My other suggestion is to throw a Readme.txt in there.

Oh yeah, also the image file should be able to use relative filenames as well as absolute. When I tried loading the example .fmk it said "C:\foo.tif" could not be found.

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FontMaker2.exe - Unable To Locate Component
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This application has failed to start because MFC71U.DLL was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.
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OK
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Quote:Original post by Boder
I got it to run, but I needed a DLL. I'm going to link you from the GPWIKI. My other suggestion is to throw a Readme.txt in there.

Oh yeah, also the image file should be able to use relative filenames as well as absolute. When I tried loading the example .fmk it said "C:\foo.tif" could not be found.

---------------------------
FontMaker2.exe - Unable To Locate Component
---------------------------
This application has failed to start because MFC71U.DLL was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

Thanks for the great feedback. I will put the DLL and some documentation in there. When it couldn't find the file did it give you the option to locate the file? You think it should use just relative path names in the XML file? How would it use both?

Oh, and what is GPWIKI?

Thanks!

1) any chance of this program becoming opensource?

2) needed despertly something like auto-glyph all the letters; doing it one by one is tiring. I figure its not much harder than doing the intelli-size feature (basically look for non-zero alpha pixel and surround its shape with minimal glyph). After the auto-glyph'ing its just a matter of setting the floor line for each which is much less work (I guess this has to be manual [sad]).

3) if option 2 isn't going to happen at least make the user interface smoother - keyboard shortcuts can help, and add new glyph shouldnt appear at the corner but rather be selected (like a rectangle in mspaint).

4) this sort of thing is useful for 2d sprites (not just letters)
for example have a bitmap of the player in difference animations frames, and use the program to make xml file with the info for each frame (name of animation, coordinates in bitmap, number of frame). I started something similar (in C#).

Iftah.

Hey, I noticed you're just over the hill from me!

For the relative path, maybe it could be relative to the .fmk file? So if was in the same directory the image filename would be "image.tif" and in the previous "../image.tif"

I put the link under font tools in the Game Programming Wiki.

Quote:Original post by Boder
Hey, I noticed you're just over the hill from me!

For the relative path, maybe it could be relative to the .fmk file? So if was in the same directory the image filename would be "image.tif" and in the previous "../image.tif"

I put the link under font tools in the Game Programming Wiki.

Yeah, that's funny... I surf over in Santa Cruz a lot.

I FMK file is really just the project file. The file you use for the game is the exported RFT (rasterized font) file together with the compressed and texture-sized (^2) .TGA file.

I am working on making the font names relative at the moment, but realized I need to write a little MakeRelativePath function first. Should have it done soon though.

Quote:Original post by Iftah
1) any chance of this program becoming opensource?

2) needed despertly something like auto-glyph all the letters; doing it one by one is tiring. I figure its not much harder than doing the intelli-size feature (basically look for non-zero alpha pixel and surround its shape with minimal glyph). After the auto-glyph'ing its just a matter of setting the floor line for each which is much less work (I guess this has to be manual [sad]).

3) if option 2 isn't going to happen at least make the user interface smoother - keyboard shortcuts can help, and add new glyph shouldnt appear at the corner but rather be selected (like a rectangle in mspaint).

4) this sort of thing is useful for 2d sprites (not just letters)
for example have a bitmap of the player in difference animations frames, and use the program to make xml file with the info for each frame (name of animation, coordinates in bitmap, number of frame). I started something similar (in C#).

Iftah.

Good feedback.

1. I am not sure about it becoming opensource... doesn't that involve having someone to collate the changes. Not sure I have time to do that.

2. Interesting idea. I'll definitely look into an auto-glyph feature!

3. Agreed. I think a toolbox will help a lot here. I'll look at the new glyph being positioned using the mouse. Maybe I'll put an 'add glyph' on the tool menu so you can just click, click, click to add 3 glyphs for example.

4. True, but I wouldn't want to try and cater for both in the same application. This is specifically for fonts.

Hopefully I understand the process now. You can take a look: http://www.gpwiki.org/index.php/Tools:Content#Font_Tools

[Edited by - Sneftel on March 4, 2006 2:33:05 AM]

Quote:Original post by Boder
Hopefully I understand the process now. You can take a look: <a href='http://www.gpwiki.org/index.php/Tools:Content#Font_Tools>http://www.gpwiki.org/index.php/Tools:Content#Font_Tools

Perfect!

Wiki entry looks very good now, thank you.

Ok, I have made some changes and am uploading version 1.1. Changes are...

Path names are now relative to where the XML files are saved.
I have removed the new glyph menu item in favor of a insert glyph tool that adds a new glyph at the cursor position (auto-glyph is too hard because you really need to place the baseline first (this is how intellisize works, by knowing the baseline is constant)).
Added a toolbox.
Implemented modified flag to warn on new/open/exit after making changes without saving.

[Edited by - Raeldor on March 7, 2006 4:15:46 PM]