Custom Font Ghoster Update v0.6 for Gimp 2.10

Download, unzip and install to your Gimp 2.10 user plug-ins folder:



A pdf version of this text:



This update attempts to improve the ghosting for certain characters (such as the dash or minus character) that have a lot of empty space above and below the character. This can give a rather sparse look to the ghosting effect, as seen below, especially if you want to use all of the available space for most of the other characters.



The new dialog has options for adding characters for which you want to limit the spacing and to use a separate value for this spacing (remember that the plug-in selects a random value within this limit).



A custom font with limits at 100%.



And the same custom font with the following limits:





A now much more pleasing effect with the dash and full stop (period) characters I think.

Have fun...

Thank you so much, Skinnyhouse.

Always grateful for your support Issa.

Optimizing the ghosting effect (Gimp 2.10)

Obviously adding ghost characters to a custom font will look better where there is enough space for the characters to ghost into.

I find that the quickest way to make an assessment of the space available is to open the custom font in Gimp and make all the layers visible. Hold down the Shift key and click on the eye symbol in the Layers tool dock.

You can see in the image below how there is only a small amount of room above the characters but there is too much space below the majority of the characters. (The underscore character is the usual low-hanging candidate – but this can easily be dealt with.)



The solution is to use Custom Font Layer Utilities to add space above to all layers and then crop the image using a selection.

Open the filter:

Custom Fonts>>Utility Tools>>Custom Font Layer Utils v1.34b Tabbed

Use the second tab option to enter the amount of extra spacing required. You can always run the filter again if you need more space than the maximum value allows. In my case with my original layer height of 800 pixels I added another 100pixels with the relevant option.



The spacing proportions look better now for ghosting.



Before removing space from the bottom of the layers we need to re-position the rogue underscore layer. I added a guideline to reference the new bottom edge for the custom font. Use the Move tool: Put the pointer over the character and drag it into the new location.



Switch to the Rectangle tool (Keypress R) and drag a selection around the layer to retain its original width.

Crop the layer to the selection:

Layer>>Crop to Selection



Finally use the Rectangle tool again to remove any unwanted space at the bottom of the custom font. Drag the rectangle out to define the required new size and crop with:

Image>>Crop to Selection



This will conveniently crop all the custom font layers to the height of the image.

Skinnyhouse, thanks again for your awesome plugin.
I find the results really cool. Thanks for your explanation about spacing in the fonts, too. It's practical and very useful.
One suggestion, if it's not too much trouble and if possible: When using the "to current active layer" option, could it be possible to display the results in separate layers instead of combined? This would be helpful some time if the user wanted to make some final adjustments. Thank you so much.

That certainly is quite do-able Issa.
Great idea!

Set the last option to 'No' so that layers do not merge when in active layer mode.

Good!!!!!! Thank you so much Skinnyhouse.
I love it!