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From: CAB@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU (Chuck Bigelow)
Newsgroups: comp.laser-printers
Subject: font tuning
Message-ID: <8710051650.AA20789@brillig.umd.edu>
Date: Sat, 3-Oct-87 11:24:00 EDT
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Posted: Sat Oct  3 11:24:00 1987
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For an intelligent discussion of one way to achieve font tuning, i.e.
conformation of outline fonts to digital grids for better aesthetics and
legibility, see "Character Generation under Grid Constraints" by Roger
Hersch, Siggraph '87 (Computer Graphics, Vol. 21, No.4, July 1987).
Hersch is at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne.

See also "Automatic Generation of Digital Typographic Images from Outline
Masters" by Phillip Apley, describing work done by the author and, earlier,
by Richard Bryan, on constrant-based scaling and scan-conversion.
(regrettably, I don't have the details of where it was published --
perhaps someone out there in net land can fill in the missing blanks;
Bitstream, do you read this?). Peter Karow's book, "Digital Formats for
Typefaces" touches on the subject.

Adobe's "hints", Bitsream's "plaid", Compugraphic's "Intellifont" data,
Imagen's "constraints", and URW's "VS format" are, each in their own way,
attempts to enhance scaling and scan-conversion of outlines to rasters. CG
Intellifont has been patented, so the patent should be available to those
interested.

Hersch reveals more than most about his methods because his is an academic
paper. It generated a good deal of interest at Siggraph.