Good News for Fontlab Users

[A_B_C]

Hi everybody,

 

good news for type designers and everyone else who uses Fontlab. According to my first tests with the Fontlab VI Public Preview, it seems that .svg files exported from Affinity Designer can now be imported perfectly into the upcoming version of Fontlab. The .eps files I tried still behave a little strangely, but I hope these issues will be ironed out in the future.

 

Fortunately, this new option closes a compatibility gap:

 

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/8681-more-clipboard-and-or-export-options/

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/19419-from-affinity-to-fontlab/

 

Don’t know if anyone else cares for this …  :D

Just wanted to mention …

 

Alex  :)

[Alfred]

I've just posted to the 'Affinity to FontLab' thread to report that I get the same weird shape if I import Andrea's EPS file into High-Logic FontCreator.

[JGD]

This is, indeed, great news… FontLab has always been the gold standard for cross-platform digital font design, and VI, judging from the beta, is shaping up to be a great release (even though they went about implementing cross-platform support in a less than optimal way, by using Qt… Alas, one couldn't expect much better from such a niche app anyway).

However, Glyphs.app is also a strong contender (especially when compared with the arcane FLS5), so I shall try importing vectors made in AD into it if you wish. ;)

[Bauke]

This is, indeed, great news… FontLab has always been the gold standard for cross-platform digital font design, and VI, judging from the beta, is shaping up to be a great release (even though they went about implementing cross-platform support in a less than optimal way, by using Qt… Alas, one couldn't expect much better from such a niche app anyway).

 

However, Glyphs.app is also a strong contender (especially when compared with the arcane FLS5), so I shall try importing vectors made in AD into it if you wish. ;)

 

I just had a quick look in Glyphs.app. It looks like importing and exporting shapes between AD and Glyphs.app works, except for the fact that somewhere during the transfer, all connections between curved segments are broken (round node-icons become square node-icons).

[Hokusai]

I was just curious as to which one you guys prefer, FontLab Studio or Glyphs? A long time ago I used to use Fontographer, I know that FontLab still sells Fontographer but it isn't as feature rich as FontLab Studio. Glyphs looks nice to me but I've never used either program. 

 

Hokusai

[Bauke]

I have never used anything else but Glyphs, and so far I'm only drawing Latin script, but I can absolutely recommend it. It has a very active community, good documentation and a lot of third party plugins. The whole application has a smooth and modern feel.

[Hokusai]

Bauke,

 

Thanks, I have watched all the videos on their website and read as much as I can about it. It looks good. Do you use the Full Glyphs or the Mini? Just curious. 

 

Hokusai

[Bauke]

I use the full version of Glyphs, but depending on what you need, Glyphs Mini is excellent for trying out the software (you can get a discount when you upgrade to the full version).

[Hokusai]

Bauke,

 

Thanks for the information. I don't know if I would need all the features of the full version or not so Glyphs mini seems like a good place to start. 

 

Best regards,

Hokusai

[A_B_C]

Hi Hokusai, 

 

unfortunately, I can’t tell you anything more substantial about the Glyphs app. I have been using Fontographer since Mac OS 7.5 onwards, and later I migrated to Fontlab, which was, in a way, the natural choice. Fontlab is still a very comprehensive application, and the new version looks very promising. Of course, I also downloaded the Glyphs trial some time ago and played around with the app a little, but I did not really find the time to deal with the program more deeply, so sharing my impressions would be pretty worthless and biased by the long-time use of Fontographer and Fontlab. But Glyphs definitely feels like an ambitious project, and considering the price tag of the mini version, it would certainly be worth a try …

 

Cheers, Alex  :)

[Hokusai]

A_B_C,

 

Thanks for your advice. I started using Fontgrapher back around the System 7 days too (I can't remember exactly when but sometime in the System 7 days). I always enjoyed it and while I'm not a professional type designer, I do like to experiment with my own fonts from time to time. Normally I would use Fontgrapher just to add a company logo into a font or occasionally a special character of some kind but I didn't use it to make professional fonts (but I have always wanted to). I did make a font of my own handwriting once using it and while it worked, it wasn't great (I had a hard time with the kerning in Fontgrapher). My skills at using vectors have improved greatly since then I would like to do more but the price of Fontlab is pretty steep for someone like me (someone who dabbles). Glyphs is more affordable, especially the Mini version (but I don't know if it is powerful enough) but you're right, it would be worth a try (especially for the price). Glyphs also looks powerful and if I can get vectors created in Affinity Designer into Glyphs then that is all the better.

 

Thanks,

Hokusai