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Make Your Own Fonts, In a Web Browser

Posted by timothy on from the cool-idea dept.

Dekortage writes "Although it's been up for a few weeks, today is the official launch of FontStruct, a web-based font creation tool. That's right: in your web browser, you can build your own typeface, and download it as a TrueType font. The site's user agreement requires you to release your creations online under one of the Creative Commons licenses. The typefaces tend to be a little blocky, but it's still impressive (and a great way to pass time)."

14 of 147 comments (clear)

  1. Why would anyone post this on slashdot? by astrashe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There's no way a site like this could withstand heavy traffic. I don't know why the editors would sink it like this.

    It will probably be dead for days now.

  2. Re:They can't do that by Bogtha · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There's no part of copyright law that allows a tool creator to dictate how the output of the tool can be licensed

    Who needs copyright? If you don't agree to the terms, they simply won't generate the font file for you. Just because they don't have copyright over the final result, it doesn't mean they are compelled to provide you with service.

    --
    Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
  3. This is great. by arthurpaliden · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is great. You no longer just have to waste time trying to find the font that is just right. Now, you can waste even more time by building it exactly the way you want.

    --
    Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
    1. Re:This is great. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't know how many times font forge has made for many an unproductive day.

  4. Re:They can't do that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I think part of the reason for requiring the CC license is because as part of the site, your font shows up as a font that was recently created. In other words, by creating the font, you're submitting that user-created content to the community. If you're submitting it to the community, they require that it be released under a license where people can actually use the font.

    (So, essentially, "if you don't like it, don't post" except that when you create, it posts automatically.)

  5. because 90% of the world cant use it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    But this being a web application (like gmail/calendar/docs) it only needs a dom based browser to have fun with (which is "everyone",more or less right?) and supports the most common font format on the planet by default, truetype .ttf

    Metafont isn't like any of those easy requirements, it doesnt "just work" for "everyone", it could, but it doesn't, so it fails.

    thats why not METAFONT

  6. but .. but .. why ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    No, rly, it boggles my mind. Why would one ever want to create another font ? About ten of them is roughly enough for all sane intents and purposes.

    1. Re:but .. but .. why ? by Hatta · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Apparently you don't know any graphic designers. After you use the same font about a thousand times, you get sick to all hell of it. Using the same font over and over again makes your work look repetetive, boring, and not as much fun as it should be. Using unique fonts can put some originality back in your work.

      Of course, that mainly applies to display fonts. Text fonts are pretty limited in their design because they need to be legible.

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    2. Re:but .. but .. why ? by Dekortage · · Score: 2, Insightful

      There's a troll if I ever read one.

      A bad graphic designer puts the shiny above the usable. A good graphic designer recognizes when a bit of shiny actually enhances the results -- and for a designer and fonts, it may be that too many other people are using a font, so it no longer stands out. When WIRED Magazine launched, they made the then-fresh Myriad typeface popular, and Apple adopted it not long afterwards. Now it's everywhere (and is even the default chosen typeface in many Adobe apps). So what was fresh before, is boring and mundane now.

      --
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  7. Re:They can't do that by Culture20 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Click through contracts are rarely enforcible. ... if the click is expected after delivery of end product and receipt of payment. This would be a contract you click before you get the end product... and there's not even any payment!
  8. Fonts are hard work by StreetStealth · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Indeed, indeed.

    There's a reason that professionally designed, usability-centered type families cost hundreds of dollars -- they take many months of careful planning, experimentation (often through scientific trials), and adjustment to bring from concept to completion.

    It is no more possible to quickly design a good typeface online than it is to quickly design a good CRM system and database backend using an easy online construction kit.

    --
    Your mind is clear / The things that you fear / Will fade with how much you / Believe what you hear
  9. Don't Like The Forced CC License by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Much as I like OSS, I don't like the forced approach here to requiring you to license your creative work for free. Encourage it sure, but to force it? Suppose you just want your own personal font? It won't be yours here, since anyone else can have it too.

    Even if they had just said you can't make it here for free and then sell it for money on your own I'd feel better about that. That way my own font could remain my own.

    So while it's a nice idea, couldn't they have been a little less heavy-handed about it?

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
  10. Re:Great by Nimey · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Yes, as if MySpace wasn't ugly enough!

    --
    Hail Eris, full of mischief...

    E pluribus sanguinem
  11. Re:Great by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Why wouldn't you want to sell your product in China, Japan, Taiwan and India? China and India have over 1/3 of the world's population.

    If you design in support for those languages early, it's really not too difficult or expensive, considering the possible reward.