Manually installed fonts all look the same

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

GIMP Version: 2.8.16
Operating System: Windows
OS Version: Windows 7 64 bit SP1
GIMP Experience: Basic Level

Hello Gimpchat. It seems several of the fonts all look the same and do not resemble what they should. I checked the preferences and the online documentation. It said that if I'm on windows that if I install the fonts into the windows directory that the os would work it's magic.

Well, the fonts show up in gimp, but the ones I'm installing all look the same. Namely, fixedsys and a few others I copied from BBLean (blackbox for windows) called the artzwiz pack.

Thank you for your consideration. I'd appreciate any suggestions.

molly · **Joined:** Apr 07, 2010 **Posts:** 14182

All the windows fonts will be in your default windows font folder.

When you add new fonts, you should place them in your c:Windows user folder.

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

molly, I know. I did that.

Wallace · **Posted:** Sat Mar 19, 2016 12:27 pm **(#4)**

Have you installed these fonts into Windows or into your Gimp User Fonts folder?

molly · **Joined:** Apr 07, 2010 **Posts:** 14182

Could you place these fonts into a zip folder and post them here so we can try them?

Wallace · **Posted:** Sat Mar 19, 2016 1:38 pm **(#6)**

It may be a file extension issue.
I install all these fonts into my Gimp user fonts folder and have experienced the same behavior as adabo did.
I also installed the Fixedsys, which seems to work as it should.

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

Wallace wrote:

Have you installed these fonts into Windows or into your Gimp User Fonts folder?

Both:

Code: Select all

C:\Windows\Fonts
C:\Users\username\.gimp-2.8\fonts

In the .gimp-2.8\fonts folder the font name gets changed eg: "Windows\Fonts\FixedSys Regular" to "\.gimp-2.8\fonts\vgafix.fon". I don't know if that means anything.

However there is another folder listed in Gimp preferences that I did not install the font to:

Code: Select all

C:\Program Files\GIMP 2\share\gimp\2.0\fonts

molly · **Joined:** Apr 07, 2010 **Posts:** 14182

The share folder is the default one.
I don't ever add fonts or anything else to the share folder, only to my user folders.

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

Ok, I've added the font to the default one, but no change after restart. Here is an example of 2 different fonts looking exactly the same (The forum won't let me link the images. You can remove the spaces):
fixedsys
http:/ /i.imgur.co m/AihdTLF.png
cure
htt p:/ /i.imgur.co m/L1OWVg7.png

Wallace · **Posted:** Sat Mar 19, 2016 2:30 pm **(#10)**

adabo wrote:

Ok,
I've added the font to the default one,
but no change after restart. Here is an example of 2 different fonts looking exactly the same (The forum won't let me link the images. You can remove the spaces):
fixedsys
http:/ /i.imgur.co m/AihdTLF.png
cure
htt p:/ /i.imgur.co m/L1OWVg7.png

I can't seem to get the links to function.

The .fon file extension is a Bitmap font,
which contains bitmaps of the font in them.
This is a picture of the font at a specific size that has been optimized to look good at that size.
It cannot be scaled bigger without making it look horrendously ugly.
I'm guessing that this is why all these fonts with this file extension show with the same font characteristics within Gimp.

As far as the Fixedsys font,
it has a file extension of .ttf and works fine in my Gimp and anywhere else on my system.

What file extension is your Fixedsys font?

Attachment:

File comment: Here are the fonts...

Fonts in Question.zip [31.93 KiB]
Downloaded 197 times

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

Wallace wrote:

The .fon file extension is a Bitmap font,
which contains bitmaps of the font in them.
This is a picture of the font at a specific size that has been optimized to look good at that size.
It cannot be scaled bigger without making it look horrendously ugly.
I'm guessing that this is why all these fonts with this file extension show with the same font characteristics within Gimp.

As far as the Fixedsys font,
it has a file extension of .ttf and works fine in my Gimp and anywhere else on my system.

What file extension is your Fixedsys font?[/align]

Ok, that makes a lot of sense. My fixedsys is not ttf, it's .fon. Should I look into finding a way to convert my .fon fonts to .ttf?

P.S. The links work. If you paste them, just remove the spaces between / / and co m

Wallace · **Posted:** Sat Mar 19, 2016 2:46 pm **(#12)**

adabo wrote:

Ok, that makes a lot of sense.
My fixedsys is not ttf,
it's .fon.
Should I look into finding a way to convert my .fon fonts to .ttf?

P.S. The links work. If you paste them, just remove the spaces between / / and co m

Yes I would suggest that you try and convert the .fon files into .ttf or .otf files.
Better yet would be to find them as .ttf, so you wouldn't need to convert them.

I did convert one of the .fon files to .ttf and installed it into my Gimp user Font folder.
It still shows with the same behavior as it did before, even though it's now a .ttf file.
Also when I try to open this converted font file with windows default font viewer.
I get the message seen in the image below.
So converting these files doesn't seem to make them work correctly.

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

Wallace, Thank you. It appears that gimp works well with ttf. Unfortunately the ttf font I found online did not look precisely like my .fon version. For now I have a slow workaround (open in paint, type out phrases, copy, paste in gimp).

Yes, I tried converting and windows did not recognize it as a font file anymore lol. From now on I'll just stick to ttf.

Wallace · **Posted:** Sat Mar 19, 2016 3:38 pm **(#14)**

adabo wrote:

Wallace,
Thank you.
It appears that gimp works well with ttf. Unfortunately the ttf font I found online did not look precisely like my .fon version.
For now I have a slow workaround (open in paint, type out phrases, copy, paste in gimp).

Yes,
I tried converting and windows did not recognize it as a font file anymore lol.
From now on I'll just stick to ttf.

No problem adabo. :bigthup

Your work around,
looks like it might get a bit annoying after a while.
The .fon file type is an old font file type.
You're better off using .ttf or .otf font files anyway.

rich2005 · **Joined:** Mar 04, 2011 **Posts:** 2599

Some of the original pcf fonts convert easily using a python utility 'bitmap2ttf' Unfortunately the rest throw up errors. Might be possible to convert using fontforge + autotrace, but that is a bit of work.

Those converted look like

Attachment:

pcffont.jpg [ 29.74 KiB | Viewed 2867 times ]

Old bitmap fonts (fon, pcf, bcf) not much use unless trying to recreate an ancient console game. They do not scale well, and best used at their native (small) size.

adabo · **Joined:** Mar 19, 2016 **Posts:** 7

rich2005 wrote:

Some of the original pcf fonts convert easily using a python utility 'bitmap2ttf' Unfortunately the rest throw up errors. Might be possible to convert using fontforge + autotrace, but that is a bit of work.

Old bitmap fonts (fon, pcf, bcf) not much use unless trying to recreate an ancient console game. They do not scale well, and best used at their native (small) size.

Coincidentally, that is precisely what I'm making, except it's for windows and not console.

Thanks for the heads up, I'll look into fontforge. For now I'm sticking with manually made font sheets in bmp form and simply scan them during runtime.

*Edit: I totally didn't see the attachment. Thank you for sharing! You didn't have to go out of your way. However rest assured they will be put to good use

sallyanne · **Posted:** Sun Mar 20, 2016 5:26 pm **(#17)**

I only have a couple of fonts that I have put directly into the gimp folder. Most I have installed to the computer's font folder (There they can be used in all programs where fonts can be used) and I still have a lot that are 'plainer' than what they are supposed to be. And would you believe it, many of those that are plain, were in my computer when I bought it!
I guess you win some and you lose some

I have however still got a lot of fancy stuff

Norseman143 · **Joined:** Jun 22, 2015 **Posts:** 227

I am self taught, watched some tutoreals ect

But I dont understand, I load my fonts into the Windows font folder

Where and why would someone load there fonts into a gimp folder?
Is there something I am missing?

Wallace · **Posted:** Sun Mar 20, 2016 8:30 pm **(#19)**

Norseman143 wrote:

I am self taught, watched some tutoreals ect

But I dont understand, I load my fonts into the Windows font folder

Where and why would someone load there fonts into a gimp folder?
Is there something I am missing?

Fonts can take up a lot of space on you drive,
depending on the drive's size and the amount of fonts you have installed.
Every time you boot your machine,
each font that you've installed into the operating system, needs to be loaded during boot.
This can have a big effect on the boot time and also slowdown system performance.
I don't install fonts into my operating system, that I plan to use with Gimp.
Any font I wish to have present for use within Gimp.
I install into my Gimp Fonts User folder.
I have many fonts,
if I installed them all on my operating system.
I'd be looking at a very poorly preforming machine.
Your operating system already has all the fonts it needs.
In my opinion,
there's really no need to add more to the mix.

Norseman143 · **Joined:** Jun 22, 2015 **Posts:** 227

Thanks Wallace

I honestly didnt know that!

My old XP machine took forever to load, so I can understand why it takes some machines extra effort to load all those fonts
This one is about 4 times faster than my old one, so it only takes a few seconds to boot up, even with all the Fonts I have installed
The only problem I have is with patterns disappearing and now am getting a message when I start Gimp, which is annoying. Maybe I will start a new thread in the Help section if I cant get it figured out

BTW Congrats on your promotion to Modship