Another leap toward the elusive subtractive Boolean.
Each character consists of nine bricks arranged in a 3 x 3, filtered and scaled, composite-stack matrix. Insane levels of smooth detail result.
This filtered, subtractive stacking technique extends those first published here.
Enjoy a private clone to grok my unknown approach. The possibilities are endless...
>> thalamic’s description (with edit)
Permutation: The act of changing the arrangement of a given number of elements.
One font, two different brick combinations.
Picking any two bricks from the 169 available gives a total possible combinations of 14196 (169C2) different fonts. Counting a certain kinds of bricks as one--all four 45degree, for instance--gives 36 unique bricks, resulting in 630 (36C2) unique combinations or fonts.
In this font, if the bricks are swapped with each other, the result will be a different font. Hence order of the bricks matter. In which case, nCr (combinations) is not the right choice. What's needed is nPr (permutations). 169P2 gives 28392 permutations and a 36P2 gives 1260 permutations.
So, at a minimum, 1260 fonts are possible with the current implementation of FontStruct, with just this particular layout of bricks.
This whole permuatation thing is so fun and easy to play around with. The original fs Permutation series worked with just the bricks that were available by default. Since then, the FontStructor has evolved, allowing for, in part, custom bricks. This new permutation was not possible before. This one is created just to show that custom bricks can be dragged and dropped on top of the existing ones replacing the standard bricks. The bricks used here are [edit:1/4 brick staggered identical custom composites] .
Clone it and play around.
Instructions
1. Select a brick from the standard bricks or create your own custom brick.
2. Click and drag it to the brick in the first position in My Bricks until that brick turns gray.
3. Release.
4. Repeat steps 1-3 for the brick in the second position in My Bricks.
Learn. Enjoy. Share your permutation.
>> thalamic’s description (with edit)
Permutation: The act of changing the arrangement of a given number of elements.
One font, two different brick combinations.
Picking any two bricks from the 169 available gives a total possible combinations of 14196 (169C2) different fonts. Counting a certain kinds of bricks as one--all four 45degree, for instance--gives 36 unique bricks, resulting in 630 (36C2) unique combinations or fonts.
In this font, if the bricks are swapped with each other, the result will be a different font. Hence order of the bricks matter. In which case, nCr (combinations) is not the right choice. What's needed is nPr (permutations). 169P2 gives 28392 permutations and a 36P2 gives 1260 permutations.
So, at a minimum, 1260 fonts are possible with the current implementation of FontStruct, with just this particular layout of bricks.
This whole permuatation thing is so fun and easy to play around with. The original fs Permutation series worked with just the bricks that were available by default. Since then, the FontStructor has evolved, allowing for, in part, custom bricks. This new permutation was not possible before. This one is created just to show that custom bricks can be dragged and dropped on top of the existing ones replacing the standard bricks. The bricks used here are [edit: custom composites] .
Clone it and play around.
Instructions
1. Select a brick from the standard bricks or create your own custom brick.
2. Click and drag it to the brick in the first position in My Bricks until that brick turns gray.
3. Release.
4. Repeat steps 1-3 for the brick in the second position in My Bricks.
Learn. Enjoy. Share your permutation.
A winning, small-matrix rendition of this super-elliptical monoline sans. If you’d like, please enjoy a private clone to tour the brand-spankin’ new interiors.
I embraced innovation at the expense of imperfection with faux-curve composite stacks. These custom bricks are used to resolve the most glaring proportion issues besetting version 1 (and 2’s) capitals. I risk intermittent aliasing as well as potential inconsistencies in both curvature and stroke contrast. Yet these composite-stack discontinuities (A,C,D,G,J,O,Q,S,U,V) marry unexpectedly well with the extensively used macaroni bricks and remain themselves smooth up to an impressive 72pt.
Manual kerning leaves a lot of room for improvement. The alternates are included mostly for curiosity’s sake. Another work in progress with samples to follow. Feedback is always very appreciated; thanks in advance for it! :)
This is a clonePlease enjoy a private clone to see how I dealt with contrast, curves, bracketing, variable letter width and the difficult-to-achieve emboldening of the capitals’ vertical strokes within a minimal fontstruct matrix (and If you like what you see, please download for personal usage and vote kindly! :)
Intaglio’s amazing recent work makes similar strides (see the excellent rounds, for example), offering a solution before me to several of these long-standing impasses of the medium.
More characters to come... :)
This is a cloneNarrow and heavy, ultra bold Piano key designs once required fractional brick scaling to generate their distinctive slit-like counter forms while working with maximum curves. Composite stacks provide a more elegant and versatile solution to this old problem. In this way, they can be seen as an important milestone on the road toward individually scalable bricks...
Letterspacing is kept tight in this fontstruction, but still needs a great deal of manual kerning especially around all the character lacking serifs on one or both sides.
72+ initial downloads done during testing and troubleshooting. More characters to come. Enjoy, and please vote kindly. : )
This is a cloneThe ultra-low resolution of this grid may be difficult to grasp without cloning. Fontstruct’s logo has a nominal x-height of 3 bricks, by comparison.
The level of detail, control, and finesse possible in a given fonstruction depended mostly on resolution prior to the recent advent of stackable composites. Did you want it better? Make it bigger!
Brute force, now meet Elegance.
Instead of building individual glyphs hundreds of bricks tall, stackable composites allow us to design rich modular schemata hundreds of bricks deep. Using curved bricks at their largest scale, linear and curvilinear elements dynamically harmonize and oppose. As well, screen fonts can be effectively hinted (aside from notable lack of kerning controls) without sacrificing the integrity of joins and intersections. And the trapping possibilities, Oh the sweet sweet trapping possibilities...
Please, vote kindly and stay tuned for more :)
This is a cloneBrush script, art deco, classic engraving, three genera of gothic (sans serif, blackletter, and ancient alphabet!), runic, hieroglyphic, and yet still some futuristic tendencies all informed me. But do they blend?
The handwritten quality of a broad-nibbed pen or skillfully wielded marker provides the binding agent. An emulsion of all these influences, it is at once all and none. Even the strict modularity begins to melt into the background. Yet so distinctly fontstruct...
This is a cloneWhile recreating/revising one of my very first fontstructions – April 2008’s Asgard (second to last one) – I realized it was going to take something more drastic still than switching to 2x2 filter settings to realize my dream of a harmonized U&lc set.
The original’s lowercase had several compelling and unique features (at the time), the uppercase worked well enough in all caps display settings...but they very rarely sat comfortably together. The answer couldn’t have been more simple: since the caps (which surprisingly came first...or does this just reveal my noobishness at the time?) are rather narrow, the lowercase itself needed to follow a more logically elongated model.
Here the flexibility of 2x2 filters kicks into high gear as the original design’s lc is tweaked by half a brick extra height to bring about a more righteously rockin’ family.
(Asgard 1.x plateaued at 829 characters, so – as always – more to come...)