[OpenFontLibrary] hinting workflow

[Denis Jacquerye]

On Fri, Jun 25, 2010 at 5:16 AM, Schrijver <eric at authoritism.net> wrote:
>>
>> My opinion is based on PostScript hinting; for TrueType I am dependent
>> on ff's autoinstructor (which benefits from good PostScript hinting).
>
> So yes I was wondering about PostScript—are any open source fonts being distributed as PostScript? I see mainly TTF.
>
> Is that for compatibality reasons? I know postscript doesn’t play well with earlier Windows versions. What about distributing Opentype/CFF ?
>
> I’m sorry, this question must have been asked right at the beginning of OFLB…
>
>
> Since you want OpenType features in many cases, I figured Opentype with truetype outlines would be the best format to deliver in, no?

PostScript outlines in OpeType fonts are fine.
It just won't be as sharp as TrueType with instructions. But that is
alright for some people (using Mac OS X or similar antialiasing) and
depending on what medium you're using (high DPI device, paper, ...).
For most people, TrueType with high quality instructions is the best.

So if the targetted use is :
- lots of (small) text for most screens : use OpenType with TrueType
outlines with instructions;
- anything else : use OpenType with Postscript outlines with hints.

When working PostScript/CFF is actually easier to deal with. Edits are
a lot faster. So you'll probably want to design with those and then
convert it to TrueType outlines if you need to add instructions.
Working with Spiro also make things easier, but Fontforge still uses
PostScript or TrueType outlines in the files.

Cheers,
Denis Moyogo Jacquerye