Horseflesh Posted August 22, 2019 Share Posted August 22, 2019 This is kind of a weird question but it would be SO helpful if I could figure out a trick to do this... I have some "one line" fonts which are intended to make paths for laser engravers or other CNC machines. Unfortunately, to make the best use of these fonts, you need special (expensive) software to render them as actual single-line paths. Normal design tools like Illustrator and AD mangle these fonts in a variety of ways, as outline fonts aren't supposed to have open paths (as I understand it). Here's an example of what I mean. The "a" glyph looks like it's drawn with one line... but if you use the Node tool and pull at the nodes, you can see it is actually a closed path with 2 copies of every node. My laser cutter would not draw one graceful one-line "a" if I fed it this art. What I want to do is convert this to a single open path as if I drew that "a" with the pen tool. And ideally that would be through some clever few menu operations that I could apply to a big group of shapes... so I can type, convert to curves, and then process to make the text all true single-line. Does anyone have any ideas? The font pictured above is #6 from this page, but they all misbehave in similar ways. http://www.mrrace.com/CamBam_Fonts/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pšenda Posted August 23, 2019 Share Posted August 23, 2019 Export to bitmap image (PNG with high resolution), and try convert back to vector (for example https://www.vectorizer.io). Quote Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301 Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155. Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155. Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PixelPest Posted August 23, 2019 Share Posted August 23, 2019 You´ll need an centerline autotracer - otherwise you´ll always get a filled path as a result. I don´t think vectorizer.io supports this feature like SuperVectorizer. I have a few CNC-fonts but all convert keys into at least a double line - which may cause extra processing time. Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.