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View Full Version : How do you create and use a bitmap font based on GIMP png output?



MikeBraxner
October 21st, 2014, 07:09 PM
I'm currently striving to enliven my desktop using conky, which works surprisingly well so far. However, to spruce up the presentation, I would like to employ somewhat unusual effects, such as an 'inset font' (e.g. 1 (http://sotak.co.uk/blog/letterpress-effect-in-gimp) , 2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsBWCN3u1xA), 3 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiwrdMt1K6c)), an 'intarsia/quilted font' (http://www.mahvin.com/2011/05/psp-quilted-text-tutorial-converted-to.html) or a metalic appearing font (http://penguinpetes.com/b2evo/index.php?p=351). I have managed to get some decent looking png's exported from GIMP with stock phrases (e.g. "Sunday", "April",...) and used those to display my "text".

Since this was not quite what I was hoping for, I decided to try and 'make' a bitmap font. Apparently, it did not help that I only have the vaguest notion of what a bitmap font actually is ... you know, colored little glyphs that would get printed on screen when I when I called my 'out' function like this out(font="the_Bitmap_Font_Name","The quick brown fox ...").

I got so far as to use Shoebox (http://renderhjs.net/shoebox/bitmapFont.htm) to turn a GIMP prepared png with the effect I'm looking for into what I believe to be a bitmap font with definition file ... except I don't know if this really is a usable font, or how to install it.

Have I got all this wrong? Did I really end up with a usable font, or just so much junk ... or do I need to 'package' it differently?

ANY help would be greatly appreciated.