All glyphs not showing as options

[ShenaJ]

I'm trying to create a design using Grrovy Script - Retro Font which has a bunch of glyphs for each letter. However, in Designer, i'm not getting any of those glyphs, just the standard characters. I use this font in other applications without any trouble. I've tried switching the Glyph Browser from Glyphs, to Unicode, to Unicode Plus Alternates and it makes no difference. Can anyone tell me how I can find the rest of my glyphs? 

[GarryP]

Can you show us what your Glyph Browser looks like when you are trying to select one of the glyphs you want to select?

Also, is that font a variable font or a static font?

[ShenaJ]

Absolutely! Here it is.

[ShenaJ]

Also, here is an example of the amount of glyphs included just for that L. This is what I would hope to see on Designer.

[GarryP]

Thanks for the screen-grabs.

If the font you are using is this one https://elements.envato.com/groovy-retro-font-8M4TS9R then that doesn’t look like a ‘simple’ font so I don’t know how well it will work in the Affinity applications, and I don’t have an envato log-in to download and test it myself.

Someone else should be able to though so I’ll leave it to someone who can help better than me.

[ShenaJ]

@GarryP thank you, I appreciate you trying to help! Yes, that's the correct font. I didn't link it here because I wasn't sure that was allowed.

 

Thanks again, for trying!

[GarryP]

You’re welcome; fingers crossed that someone will be able to give you better news.

[Alfred]

27 minutes ago, ShenaJ said:

I didn't link it here because I wasn't sure that was allowed.

It’s not OK to share commercial font files, but it’s always OK to link to third-party resources so that other forum users can see exactly what you’re working with.

Hendra Pratama’s ‘Groovy’ typeface offers Swashes, Ligatures, Contextual Alternates, Stylistic Alternates and Stylistic Sets. Have you tried switching on the various OpenType features instead of accessing the glyphs directly via the Glyph Browser?

[ShenaJ]

@Alfred thank you for that info, I figured it was better to err on the side of caution. 

 

As far as turning on OpenType features, I'm not sure how to do that, can you explain further. I'm trying hard to switch away from Illustrator and all that was just automatic there.

[Alfred]

Go to the Typography section of the Character panel to choose any of the supported OpenType features.

[ShenaJ]

@Alfred thank you! I was able to find them. Takes a bit more thought, but happ to get it to work!

[Alfred]

29 minutes ago, ShenaJ said:

@Alfred thank you! I was able to find them. Takes a bit more thought, but happ to get it to work!

That’s great news, @ShenaJ! Thanks for the update.

[lacerto]

On 3/22/2024 at 5:38 PM, ShenaJ said:

Takes a bit more thought, but happ to get it to work

What a technologically interesting font! The way it works and makes its alternative glyphs available made me wonder whether there is some specific method (e.g., using a pen) to invoke different glyph versions, but based on the YouTube video created by the author of the font it seems that no, the text is basically supposed to be composed (or enhanced) letter by letter, and for this purpose Affinity Typography panel with dynamic Alternates controls suits acceptably well even if the size of the alternates remains pretty small.

But as the Character panel has a button labelled as "Character Variants"...

...I wonder if this is something that is intended to show alternatives for single characters in a separate window (and in bigger size), but just has not been implemented yet? (I could not find a way to make this feature working with any of the fonts that I tested.) Another thing that seems to need some improvement is the Typography panel itself, which cannot currently be resized (especially in width, to make more wide character selections fully visible), and using white text samples for stylistic sets in the Stylistic Sets list (in context of the Character panel).

This font made me also wonder whether certain typographic features like "Contextual Alternates" and "Stylistic Alternates" (and the combination of both), and even Stylistic Sets, are kinds of presets designed to be used with all the characters using the same font (instead of requiring character-wise selection of alternatives, which there can be over 20 for certain characters)? Based on my very superficial tests, in context of certain fonts it might be so, though the output might be a bit different when used with Adobe apps, and Affinity apps and CorelDRAW (which btw. could be an issue when opening IDML files that use advanced OpenType typographical settings). But with many fonts that I tested (including Adobe Pro designs), it was not so, so applying e.g. a specific stylistic set for entire text would produce absurd results (end forms used uncritically disregarding position of the character, etc.). Also, text might have multiple stylistic sets applied. But I began to wonder this because Adobe and Affinity apps show available stylistic sets quite differently, Adobe apps (including Photoshop 2024) and CorelDRAW showing all available stylistic variations only in context of glyph selection, while in context of e.g. Groovy Script only two stylistic sets made available in menu context, while Affinity apps show all stylistic sets available and appliable options in menu context.    

 

[Alfred]

14 minutes ago, lacerto said:

This font made me also wonder whether certain typographic features like "Contextual Alternates" and "Stylistic Alternates" (and the combination of both), and even Stylistic Sets, are kinds of presets designed to be used with all the characters using the same font (instead of requiring character-wise selection of alternatives, which there can be over 20 for certain characters)?

Welcome to the wonderful world of OpenType feature scripting! It’s possible to define classes of characters and then specify how members of those classes should (or shouldn’t!) be affected when a particular OpenType feature is switched on.

AFDKO (Adobe Font Development Kit for OpenType): OpenType™ Feature File Specification

[kenmcd]

Some of the "features" are actually OpenType (OT) features and some are constructions by the application. For example there is no All Caps feature in OT.

5 hours ago, lacerto said:

But as the Character panel has a button labelled as "Character Variants"...

...I wonder if this is something that is intended to show alternatives for single characters in a separate window (and in bigger size), but just has not been implemented yet? (I could not find a way to make this feature working with any of the fonts that I tested.)

Character Variants (cvNN) is an actual OT feature which Affinity does support when it is actually present. To test take a look at the fonts Charis SIL and Junicode. They both have OT Character Variants. ID does not support cvNN at all (there is an add-on available which does).

5 hours ago, lacerto said:

But I began to wonder this because Adobe and Affinity apps show available stylistic sets quite differently, Adobe apps (including Photoshop 2024) and CorelDRAW showing all available stylistic variations only in context of glyph selection

Affinity only shows the actual OT feature Access All Alternates (aalt) if it actually exists in the font. Adopey apps construct this (whether it actually exists or not in OT) and that is what is displayed in the alternates pop-up. 

Groovy Script actually has an aalt feature and the font developer actually created it manually (more advanced font editors can create it automatically). Pluses and minuses - Automatically may create duplicates and odd exceptions - Manually may miss alternates but could also be a well thought-out and better.

It appears there is a newer version of the font with more features than the version I have (v1.000).

Regarding the Stylistic Sets (ssNN) - it appears the newer font may have multiple alternates on the ssNN (like on cvNN). Junicode 2 has started doing this. Because they have more than ss01-ss20 (and do not want to exceed ss20). Some apps will work all the way up to ss99 (APub, ID, LibreOffice), and some fonts will use up to ss99. And some apps will only display up to ss20 (Word). And some do not work with the ssNN variants. Since ID does not support OT Character Variants at all, I assume it also may not support variants in Stylistic Sets.

And on and on...

Would have to see the newer font to determine exactly what is happening.

 

Additional thoughts...

- applying some OT features will block other OT features (depends on the order inside the font)

- fonts may have errors/bugs in the OT features. The more complex the font, the more likely there are issues. 

[walt.farrell]

7 hours ago, lacerto said:

But as the Character panel has a button labelled as "Character Variants"...

...I wonder if this is something that is intended to show alternatives for single characters in a separate window (and in bigger size), but just has not been implemented yet? (I could not find a way to make this feature working with any of the fonts that I tested.)

If you try that button with Charis SIL or Junicode you get a display like the one you showed:

It feels odd that the button is not highlighted as being active, until after I click on it, so there's no way to be sure if it will do anything before you click.

 

[kenmcd]

3 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

It feels odd that the button is not highlighted as being active, until after I click on it, so there's no way to be sure if it will do anything before you click.

Should be grayed-out and do nothing if there are no Character Variants. And as you say, be highlighted when there are.

[lacerto]

6 hours ago, kenmcd said:

ID does not support cvNN at all (there is an add-on available which does).

I am not sure what you mean. Even CS6 shows them in the Glyphs panel as Alternates for Selection, and the glyph info itself shows whether an alternative is coded as character variant (cv), or something else. But they are not listed uniformly in a separate control (nor are stylistic alternatives), unlike in Affinity apps.

6 hours ago, kenmcd said:

Affinity only shows the actual OT feature Access All Alternates (aalt) if it actually exists in the font. Adopey apps construct this (whether it actually exists or not in OT) and that is what is displayed in the alternates pop-up. 

I do not understand. Are you saying that these are constructed alternates?

The difference I was referring to was mainly related to listing of Stylistic Sets. E.g. CorelDRAW, Adobe apps and VectorStyler only list two Stylistic Sets for Groovy Script, while Affinity apps list total of 29. Access All Alternates are also listed differently, in CorelDRAW, Adobe apps and VectorStyler only forms that actually exist get listed, in Affinity apps total number of alternates gets listed for all glyph selections, whether any alternative forms exists or not (and whether irrelevant features are hidden or not).

I am just confused, and probably have misunderstood something. 

[lacerto]

I now used Junicode in InDesign, and might have a little (but only little) better understanding on the way glyphs are listed in Stylistic Sets and Character Variables (both in InDesign and Affinity apps). They do get listed also in InDesign as a category (rather than just contextually as alternatives for selected glyphs), but this is not so obvious for anyone not well aware of internals of OpenType technology unless using sorts of super fonts as Junicode.

It seems that InDesign lists alternatives for a selected glyph based on encoding (glyph names), as e.g. for Latin capital letter Eng it also lists Runic letters Ing and Ingwaz, so stylistically and otherwise totally unrelated glyphs. CorelDRAW does the same thing when using its OpenType contextual selector, as does VectorStyler. Perhaps this is what you mean by "construction" of aalt glyphs for glyph selection, whether they exist in OT for a selected glyph or not? 

Anyway, when having Junicode active, InDesign does list up to 20 Stylistic Sets for the font, and, it seems, without showing the table names, all available Character Variable tables, as well (in order):

The screen recorder I use on Windows unfortunately appears to disable tool tips so the glyph names (and cv codes) shown by InDesign are not displayed in recording, but it seems all tables from cv01 to cv98 get listed. There are also some other unnamed tables like rtlm which lists Runic letters.

On the other hand, Photoshop 2024 (latest version) only shows three alternative glyphs for capital letter Eng (in Junicode), not the Runic ones, but then fails to show any if Alternates for Selection is selected. And it only shows three named Stylistic Sets for the whole font. So I cannot say that my confusion has remarkably diminished.

[kenmcd]

Had thoughts/explanations in response to your post yesterday, and the new post today - but just don't feel like contributing to the Affinity forum today...for some reason...