Copy anchors proportionally option

[tiroj]

I have been very grateful for the existence of the Copy Anchors tool. Looking at a project today, it struck me that it would be useful to have an option in this tool—or maybe a separate script?—to copy and paste anchor locations proportional to the advance width. In some Indic scripts, there are a lot of marks that are optically positioned relative to the bases following rules that take into account the shape of the base glyph; this typically means that when these bases exist in different weights, widths, etc. or even in different typefaces, the anchors for these marks tend to be in similar positions relative to the advance widths of the bases. It would be helpful to be able to copy anchors from one master and paste them in another master with their positions adjusted proportionally to the advance widths of the target master.

[kateliev]

@tiroj great idea! It is now done, just pushed. This adds a new radio group that lets you select between absolute and relative positioning of the anchor.

The relative horizontal positioning is done as proportion of the glyphs advance at the layer of interest. The vertical location is still fixed (absolute). In my opinion it would be a nice to have that relative as well, but the question remains relative compared to which dimension - contour's bounding box (top) or one of the font metrics (x-height or caps height). I am very much open to suggestions - let me know if that sounds reasonable to you and which dimension do you see fit for the job.

Also you could use the tool to propagate the anchors from one layer to another within the same font by just selecting the desired layer pairs in the combo boxes. For now this works only in one by one mode - let me know if this feels bit awkward to use - could think of some UI fix.

[tiroj]

I had not considered vertical positioning. I think being able to specify a metrics height or possibly an explicit unit height would be useful. I can imagine, e.g. using this to copy cap height anchors to smallcap height anchors, although that would imply something like a copy from-and-to selection within a layer.

[kateliev]

@tiroj will think of some solution, but until then please let me know if the current script working for you.

[tiroj]

I’ve not had an opportunity to test it yet, but will try tomorrow.

[tiroj]

I am trying to test the new relative anchor positioning copy option within a single VFC file, to copy from one master to another, but I am running into a problem with the master layers not being correctly listed, even though I have clicked the button to update the list. The actual master layers in this source file are Light and Bold, but this is what I get:

[tiroj]

If I select the ‘Regular’ master from the Source Layer list, and then click the Copy Anchors button, FL8 crashes.

[kateliev]

@tiroj very strange, will investigate...

[kateliev]

@tiroj regretfully cannot confirm any of the above problems. Works as expected on both Mac ans Win - tested various scenarios - no problems whatsoever. Please let me know if you resolved the situation in any way. Also could you try another typeface after restarting FL just to confirm that the script is the one that is crashing the app.

[tiroj]

Still having the same problem, with a different font, after restarting FL8. As you see: the script dialogue is only reporting the presence of one ‘Regular’ master in both the Source and Destination Layer, not the two masters that are actually present in the font:

This time, FL did not crash when I clicked the Copy Anchors button, but the anchor of the Regular master was copied onto the Regular master, resulting in a .bak copy of the anchor. It was not copied to the Bold master.

I tried again with Regular master selected in the Source Layer and All Masters in the Destination Layer, and this crashed FontLab.

[As a general comment, I had a lot of trouble getting TypeRig to work in FL8: it seemed much more complicated than the FL7 install, and for a long time I was getting error messages any time I tried to activate the TR UI panel. I finally got that working—although I can’t remember exactly how—and the path seems to be to where I have the TR repo synced via git.]

[kateliev]

Hmm that is really strange. Still cannot confirm. Did some tests and really believed that the problem should be at my side, but... the script is really robust and simple - very little could go wrong. Could you please share what version of FL8 are you using. If i have that build in backup would love to try that. Also if you feel like we need to dig deeper you could send me a copy of the font (or subset) and an NDA to vassil(at)kateliev(dot)com

Just a note about working in All Layers mode - it will only copy anchors from font A to B if both fonts have the same layer (by name)